The Lord Bishop of Chester

Peter Robert, Lord Bishop of Chester—Was (in the usual manner) introduced between the Lord Bishop of Portsmouth and the Lord Bishop of Derby.

Road Accidents

Lord Higgins: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What conclusions they have drawn from the figures for road safety published by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, the large differences between the casualty rates for different modes of transport recently highlighted by PACTS confirm the relative rarity of major air and rail accidents and demonstrate the unacceptably high level of ones on our roads. The PACTS figures were averages for 1988 to 1997. The latest averages for 1991 to 2000 show an improvement for all modes except motorbikes and scooters, of which the number of deaths last year was the highest since 1990. We shall address this in delivering our road safety strategy Tomorrow's Roads—Safer for Everyone.

Lord Higgins: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that helpful reply. I declare an interest as both a motorist and cyclist. Does the noble and learned Lord agree that a clear conclusion from these figures is that cycling is the most dangerous form of transport and that the dangers are significantly increased by the tendency of many cyclists not to obey the law and frequently to ride at night without lights? Will the Minister ensure that the Government's publicity campaign on road safety, particularly on television, draws attention to the risks and dangers of effectively suicidal and dangerous behaviour, and will serious attempts now be made to enforce the law?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, according to the figures which give the 10-year average up until 1997, for pedal cycles there were 885 deaths or serious injuries per billion passenger kilometres. That was the second worst category. The comparable figure for two-wheeled motor vehicles, which I take to mean motorbikes and scooters, was 1,441. Those are the two worst categories. As to the second question, we published a strategy in March 2000. The key to making it as safe as possible for cyclists involves in part local transport plans but also cyclists themselves taking proper precautions, as the noble Lord said. They have a responsibility to other road users to observe traffic rules. The noble Lord is aware that the Highway Code contains a chapter on rules for cyclists. They are encouraged to make themselves more conspicuous by wearing fluorescent and reflective clothing. Pedal cycles in use on roads between sunset and sunrise should show a white light to the front, a red light to the rear and a red rear retro-reflector. It is an offence with a maximum fine of £2,500 not to comply with that road traffic requirement. Obviously, it is an important law, as the figures demonstrate. But we also need to make motorists much more conscious of the vulnerability of cyclists on the road and training to that effect is often available.

Lord Bradshaw: My Lords, in view of the fact that 3,500 people were killed and another 320,000 seriously injured on our roads last year, why have the Government issued guidelines to local authorities which make it more difficult for them to install speed cameras?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, we have introduced a range of measures to try to improve road safety, for example, guidance in relation to speed limits and local transport plans which make roads safer not just for cyclists but for all road users, including pedestrians and drivers. As to whether it is easier to install speed cameras, I am not sure about the guidance to which the noble Lord refers. If the noble Lord can refer me to it I shall write to him in response. Speed cameras have had a very good effect in reducing road accidents, and it is for each local authority or police authority to decide whether they are appropriate to their areas.

Lord Haskel: My Lords, I agree with my noble and learned friend that cycling should be encouraged for reasons of health and less pollution. Does he not agree that it would be made safer by providing a physical barrier or kerb between cycle tracks and traffic on the road? In that way, cyclists would not need to go on to the road to avoid cars parked on cycle tracks, and cars would not need to be on cycle tracks. Everything would be much safer.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, making it easier for people to walk or cycle if their journey is short is a key part of our integrated transport strategy. We are keen to promote cycling and walking. In some cases the proposal of my noble friend would be appropriate, but, as he will be aware, it is not remotely possible in every area. The wider range of measures that I referred to must be dealt with as well.

Lord Clark of Kempston: My Lords, how many prosecutions have taken place of cyclists who ride on the pavement to the danger of pedestrians, go up one-way streets the wrong way, jump the traffic lights and pay no attention to traffic control? Does the Minister not agree that it is high time that the police had a stringent and vigorous assault on cyclists who break the law, as they do with motorists?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I do not have the figures that the noble Lord asks for. I shall try to get them. He referred to such a wide range of offences that it may not be possible to get them all. I shall do my best. It is important that cyclists obey the law and know what the law is. That is demonstrated by the appalling figures to which I referred at the outset of the Question. Local authorities need to look at their local transport plans to ensure that conditions are as safe as possible for walkers and cyclists and that drivers are conscious of the vulnerability of cyclists.

Baroness Greengross: My Lords, does the Minister not agree that, contrary to public perception, older drivers are among the safest in this country? Yet they are the only group who automatically, at the age of 70, are required to have validation to drive. Would it not be better if drivers were assessed for competence at regular periods during their adult lives?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, again I do not know precisely what the figures are. My experience of more elderly drivers is that they are very safe indeed. It is sensible that there should be validation at the age of 70. In certain other circumstances, particularly after one has been disqualified or put off the road for an offence, it is right that there should be a further test. Beyond that, I am not sure that it is appropriate to have validation.

Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, I declare an interest as the newly elected president of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. Is my noble and learned friend aware that there were 9,000 deaths and 200,000 injuries among cyclists and pedestrians throughout the European Union? It is the view of virtually every expert that if there were legislation to create safer front ends of motor vehicles, the number of casualties could be substantially alleviated.
	Can my noble and learned friend comment on the report in The Times of 26th October that the Government appear to be abandoning an approach to European-wide legislation in favour of a voluntary code, which, it is felt, will not save anything like the same number of lives?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I was not aware of the statistics to which my noble friend refers. There is an advisory group on motorcycling that is examining inter alia vehicle safety and security. As to the issue of car safety, that is something that we should look into but obviously I can give no assurance that we shall take that forward.

Afghanistan: Cluster Bomb Policy

Lord Campbell of Croy: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What is their policy on the use of cluster bombs in operations against Taliban terrorists.

Lord Bach: My Lords, the cluster bombs used in Afghanistan have not been prohibited by any treaty or convention. They are employed only against legitimate terrorist and military targets where they are the most effective weapon to attack the target concerned.

Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his reply. While the most effective weapon should of course be used against the Taliban, if cluster bombs are used would they contain self-destroying mechanisms to prevent them becoming landmines in the future, scattered in a way that can cause serious injury to civilians?

Lord Bach: My Lords, there are failure rates for the bomblets that are in cluster bombs. The manufacturer of the UK's cluster bomb—the RBL755—estimates the failure rate of the bomblets released from that bomb to be 5 per cent. We do not have up-to-date figures for the cluster bombs that the United States has been using in Afghanistan. The noble Lord will know that British forces have not themselves dropped any cluster bombs in Afghanistan.

The Lord Bishop of Portsmouth: My Lords, in view of our experience in the Gulf War—namely, that the longer a conflict lasts, the more difficult it becomes for the different partners to stick together—does the Minister agree that this conflict has reached the stage where both cluster and "daisy cutter" bombs are so inaccurate and dangerous that such weaponry no longer provides a viable option for the future?

Lord Bach: My Lords, with the greatest respect to the right reverend Prelate, I am afraid that I cannot agree with him. Without the use of such bombs, along with other weapons, does any noble Lord in the House believe that Mazar-i Sharif or Kabul would have fallen by now? The falling of those cities means that those who live in them are no longer controlled by the Taliban, with the risks that that control posed to their lives and also with the total lack of freedom. I must tell the right reverend Prelate that we shall use whatever weaponry is necessary to ensure that we meet the objectives of this war, not the least of which is to protect, in the future, any British troops who may be in Afghanistan.

Lord Vivian: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that a study made in February last year of the use of cluster bombs concluded that an immediate ban would be inappropriate due to their proven utility and limited scale of use when compared with the use of landmines? Is he also aware that our own troops would be put into great danger if we did not use cluster bombs to defeat the enemy?

Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. I was not aware of the study to which he referred, but I shall ensure that I take note of it. So far as concerns his second point, of course it is right that if British or coalition troops are to operate on the ground in Afghanistan, the priority must be their protection and safety. That is a matter that the Government will always bear in mind.

Lord Redesdale: My Lords, if British personnel are to be used on the ground in Afghanistan, will the Minister consider implementing further training to deal with cluster bombs? British personnel have already been killed by unexploded cluster munitions in Kosovo.

Lord Bach: My Lords, of course full training will be given to members of the British Armed Forces, as is always the case.

Lord Chalfont: My Lords, does the Minister agree that it is rather untidy to refer to cluster bombs as one kind of munition? Does he agree that the two main weapons currently being used in Afghanistan are the CBU 87, which casts out bomblets that look like cans of cola and thus might attract children to them, and the CBU 89, which scatters mines over a large area? Can the Minister confirm that the latter bombs contain a self-destruct device which can be used to destroy them before a civilian on the ground is injured?

Lord Bach: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his question and for his expertise in this area. I can tell him that the following cluster munitions have been used in Afghanistan: the air-guided munition, 154 joint stand-off weapon; the cluster bomb unit CBU 87, to which the noble Lord referred; and the CBU 103. Neither the CBU 89 nor the CBU 104 GATOR bomb has been dropped over Afghanistan. The latter two can be considered to be anti-personnel landmines.

Viscount Waverley: My Lords, one of my abiding memories of a past visit to Afghanistan is the scourge of landmines. It is estimated that some 10 million unexploded landmines are buried in the country. Will Ministers take the opportunity to factor that problem into their development programmes, as time permits?

Lord Bach: My Lords, we certainly shall do so. As the noble Lord has illustrated, many dangers exist in Afghanistan, not least from the thousands, if not millions, of anti-personnel mines that have been planted by warring parties over 20 years. We are committed to a long-term process of reconstruction in Afghanistan and we are considering ways of demining and then disposing of unexploded ordnance, which would form part of that process. Thus, the answer to the noble Viscount's question is yes.

Lord Swinfen: My Lords, does the Minister agree that a failure rate of 5 per cent for any British munition is far too high for the safety of our troops and the effectiveness of our operations? What is being done to improve the rate of burst to a satisfactory level?

Lord Bach: My Lords, as with all weapons, every effort is made to ensure that they perform as safely as is possible. I have given the House the best figures from the British manufacturers. Of course we shall do all that we can to ensure that weapons become even safer. However, if from time to time we did not use such weapons, the results would be infinitely worse, both for the citizens of Afghanistan and for the coalition troops.

Terrorism Act 2000

Lord Rotherwick: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	How many police investigations are under way under the Terrorism Act 2000 with a view to deporting terrorists.

Lord Rooker: My Lords, the answer to the noble Lord's Question is none. Investigations under the Terrorism Act 2000 are a matter entirely for the police. It is for the police and the Crown Prosecution Service to decide whether to pursue a prosecution. Since 11th September, 41 people have been arrested under the Act. Six are presently remanded in police custody. However, the Immigration Act 1971 allows the Home Secretary to take deportation action against any individual, if their presence in the United Kingdom is deemed not be conducive to the public good.

Lord Rotherwick: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his helpful Answer. Will he join me in applauding Syria on its recent action? It has extradited to Egypt Refaie Ahmed Taha, the terrorist behind the shooting of 28 British and foreign tourists in Luxor in 1997? Are the Government considering whether they should follow the example set by Syria in extraditing terrorists even if they may face the death penalty in the country to which they are extradited?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, the answer to the final part of the noble Lord's question is no. In response to the first part, I must be honest and say that I am not briefed to comment in detail on it. The noble Lord is entitled to ask me about such questions, but it simply would not be possible to give a brief response.
	However, under the terms of our extradition procedure, of the six people currently remanded in police custody—I emphasise that—two are among a total of 10 who are subject to extradition warrants. Of the 41 people I mentioned, 13 more were released into the custody of the Immigration Service. Thus they are being detained, but they are not in police custody. The subject of extradition is complex and we shall bring forward an extradition Bill in the early part of next year. However, we shall not seek powers to extradite people to countries where they would face torture or the death penalty. We shall seek other means of extradition, some details of which were included in the Bill published yesterday.

Lord Goodhart: My Lords, can the Minister confirm that the Home Secretary's powers to issue a deportation order should and will remain subject to the power of judicial review?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, I do not believe that we have any plans to change that system. We seek to introduce changes to aspects of judicial review, the details of which were included in the Bill published yesterday. We have made it clear why we intend to make those changes. No one has been denied the right to review the terms of their detention sentence. The detainee can appeal on a point of law to the Court of Appeal and, if necessary, to the House of Lords, so in that sense we are removing judicial review. We are taking steps to make the process faster, while making it fairer, in order that it should not be abused by the legal trade.

Lord Dixon-Smith: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the reluctance of the Government to resort to deportation to some countries in which there is the possibility of the use of the death penalty could lead to this country becoming, in certain circumstances, a haven for international terrorists? In turn, that could be interpreted as an incitement to violence in this country.

Lord Rooker: My Lords, the noble Lord is asking me to derogate not only from the European Convention on Human Rights, but in fact to get out of something to which this country has been a signatory under both governments for over 50 years. That is the implication if knowingly we return people to countries where they will face the death penalty. No one has suggested that we should pull away completely from the European Convention on Human Rights. If we are holding people who, we believe, are in that situation and we cannot take forward a criminal prosecution simply because the evidence is based on Security Service or surveillance sources and thus cannot be put before a court, but we believe that those people pose a threat to public safety, we are limited in our choices. We can allow them to roam free in this country; we can deport them to a safe third country, if one can be found; or we detain them. Those are three choices. We have put forward the last alternative in the Bill. It will be for others to choose between the three options. However, I should stress that we have only those three from which to choose.

Lord Marsh: My Lords, would the Minister agree that it is precisely the situation he has outlined which, for the past 40 years, has made this country the recipient of regular complaints from several countries that the UK has for many years been a safe home for terrorist groups?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, I take the noble Lord's point. Such allegations have been made. But, given the contents of the Bill we published yesterday—which, subject to parliamentary scrutiny, will become an Act before the end of the year—I do not think that anyone, anywhere, friend or foe, will be in a position to say that this country is a safe haven for terrorists. The Bill is being brought forward to block a series of loopholes. If each loophole had been taken in isolation, Parliament would probably have said it was a step too far. In the present circumstances, it is a modest, precautionary and proportionate approach to the situation that the country faces.

Lord Davies of Coity: My Lords, does my noble friend unequivocally agree that, in the present circumstances, the safety and security of the British people, of this nation, is of overriding importance? If that means a reduction in civil liberties and human rights, then so be it.

Lord Rooker: My Lords, I agree entirely with my noble friend. I cannot quote Article 1 verbatim, but I believe that it refers to the right to life. That is why it is Article 1.

Lord Renton: My Lords, can the Minister say what proportion of those so far investigated were admitted to this country as asylum seekers?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, I cannot. I do not have the individual details of the 13 people who have been released into the custody of the Immigration Service but, quite clearly, this step has been taken because of some factor relating to immigration legislation. Whether they came here as visitors and overstayed, or whether they came as asylum seekers, I am not in a position to say. If I can obtain the details, I shall write to the noble Lord.

Viscount Waverley: My Lords, what is the Government's position when receiving a complaint from a friendly government about a terrorist group which is not on the UK list of proscribed terrorists?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, if we receive a complaint, we obviously look at the case. The list has been added to considerably since 11th September—I believe there are now more than 35 organisations listed—and if someone has a complaint about its legitimacy, about a mistake in the list or about a case which they think has not received a proper hearing, we will receive their representations.

Millennium Dome

Earl Attlee: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Whether, in the event that demolition of the Millennium Dome represents best value to the taxpayer, they will consider such a course of action.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, value for money is one of the criteria for evaluating proposals for the future of the Dome, together with the requirement for any future use to provide a worthwhile and sustainable future, and for us to be assured that any proposal can be successfully delivered. Proposals will be assessed against these criteria and will take account of the value of the site without the Dome.

Earl Attlee: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for that reply. We know that there are two values for the site—one with the Dome and one without the Dome. Will the Minister come clean and say what is the difference between the two values, to the nearest £30 million, and will he say which value will appear in the accounts of English Partnerships?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I will not say what is the difference in value. Assessments have been carried out for the purpose of informing the on-going process of market testing. The reason I will not say is that discussions are going on with a small number of serious bidders at the moment and it would be prejudicial to those negotiations to give those figures. When they are prepared, the English Partnership accounts will, in accordance with good accountancy practice, take into account all information in valuing the Dome.

Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, has anything come of the idea mooted in the press the other day that the Government should consider offering the Millennium Dome, free of charge, to New York City, where it might stand, for a few years at least, on the ground space previously occupied by the twin towers while plans are made to redevelop the World Trade Centre? Is that not an idea worth investigating? Would it not permit the Dome to exit this country with some glory?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, Mr David James, the chairman of NMEC, said that the idea had no prospect whatever of deliverability. Having said that, the ideas that went into the making of the Dome could well be of assistance to the people of New York in covering ground zero. We have made clear that we will provide any assistance they may require in that respect.

Baroness Gibson of Market Rasen: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the people of Greenwich would be very angry indeed at an attempt to knock down their Dome? Recently, a 14-screen cinema has been opened on what was derelict land in the area. Without the Dome, that land would not have been regenerated. The development has provided another 80 jobs for people in the area.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I am aware of the feelings of people in the area that the Dome should stay. I am also aware of the effect of decontaminating the north Greenwich peninsula. It has made it possible for housing, health centres, schools and cinemas to be built, whereas before there was no hope of such development. I am also aware of the development and prospects for jobs that it has brought.

Viscount Astor: My Lords, does the Minister agree—it is an open secret—that the site is worth at least £300 million more without the Dome than with it? As London is very short of affordable housing, has the noble and learned Lord estimated how many families could be housed on the site if the Dome were to be demolished?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, so far as concerns the "open secret" and £300 million more for the site on which the Dome sits, I do not know from where the noble Viscount is getting his information but I can tell him that it is not accurate. So far as concerns the whole north Greenwich peninsula—not only the site of the Dome but also the area to the south of it—yes, there are very real prospects of housing being built there. Some housing has already been built in the Millennium Village, which is situated to the south of the Dome. The noble Viscount will agree that we want mixed communities; we want houses and other facilities which bring jobs.

Baroness Noakes: My Lords, throughout the whole of the year the noble and learned Lord has told your Lordships on many occasions that market testing is going on. Can he tell the House when market testing is due to be completed and when we will have a proper competition for the Dome? Will he confirm that options including and excluding the Dome structure will be a part of that competition?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, as the noble Baroness rightly pointed out, I have described the process on a number of occasions. It involves market testing and, currently, it involves discussions with a small number of bidders. The right course is for those discussions to carry on. It would be wrong for me to specify a particular timetable. It would be wrong for me to say anything else at the moment because it might prejudice those discussions.

Lord Swinfen: My Lords, market testing goes on, when there is no real intention of selling anything, just to get a realistic valuation. Is there a real intention to sell the Dome or the site?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, yes.

Business

Lord Carter: My Lords, at a convenient moment after 3.30 p.m., my noble and learned friend the Leader of the House will, with the leave of the House, repeat a Statement being made in another place on the coalition against international terrorism. It is likely that the Statement will be repeated after the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, in the first debate.

Parliament Act (Amendment) Bill [HL]

Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I beg to introduce a Bill to amend the Parliament Act 1949 so that it applies only to public Bills first introduced into the House of Commons in the third or a subsequent Session of any Parliament. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
	Moved, That the Bill be now read a first time.—(Lord Renton of Mount Harry.)
	On Question, Bill read a first time, and to be printed.

Business of the House: Debates this Day

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
	Moved, That the debates on the Motions in the names of the Lord Peyton of Yeovil and the Lord Pilkington of Oxenford set down for today shall each be limited to two-and-a-half hours.—(Lord Williams of Mostyn.)

On Question, Motion agreed to.

London Underground

Lord Peyton of Yeovil: rose to call attention to the future of London Underground; and to move for Papers.
	My Lords, the London Underground has a vital place not only in our transport system, but in the lives of millions of people who are obliged to use it daily in order to get to work. There is a somewhat bland statement in London Transport's last annual report to the effect that,
	"the Underground recognises that reliability in some areas has fallen below acceptable levels".
	I cannot help feeling that the majority of passengers would express that truth in rather rougher terms.
	It would not be helpful to take a long dive back into history and I hope that the Minister will not do so either. It must be said that when the Government came to office the London Underground was already facing severe problems. However, in recent times the situation has reached crisis levels with little sign of progress.
	In March 1998, the Deputy Prime Minister, full of the enthusiasm that, from time to time, powers—and even overpowers—him, introduced to Parliament a measure that is known to its limited friends as PPP. It is a partnership between the public and private sectors. Neither privatisation nor old-style public ownership, it was presented to Parliament as a miracle that would solve the problems of London's Underground. Under the scheme, the Tube itself, the station services, the ticketing and the drivers would continue to be the responsibility of London Underground, which would also be responsible for safety. When these arrangements were in place, London Underground's functions would be passed to the Mayor of London. Arrangements were already in hand at that time to elect such a personage.
	Under the scheme, London Underground would invite bids from three private groups. The successful bidders would each be given 30-year leases of a section of the network in which they would upgrade and maintain the infrastructure. The scheme has received and has deserved a chilly welcome. As the Mayor has frequently said, it would leave the operators of the tube altogether dependent on the private sector contractors to discharge their responsibility for safety. Similarly, an arrangement that covered prices only for the first seven and a half years of a 30-year period would leave the operator with very few cards in his hand. There were also doubts as to the wisdom of splitting a single network into three, with all the added complexity that would result.
	The scheme, dear to the heart of the Treasury, since it would, at least for the time being, serve to keep the problem off its doorstep, has the footprints of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his advisers all over it. However, he has been resolute in not becoming involved, washing his hands of the matter and declining to be told of the palpable defects of the PPP scheme. He would simply rather not know.
	Meantime, the Government were going ahead with arrangements to create a Mayor of London who would eventually be responsible for operating the network. They had a brainwave. That nice, obliging Mr Dobson could be persuaded that here was a glittering future that would be rather better and more comfortable than a seat in the Cabinet and ministerial office at the Department of Health. He could also be relied on to see the merits of PPP, even if few others did.
	Mr Livingstone then appeared—something of a cloud on the Government's horizon. He made no attempt to conceal his dislike of PPP. He thought that it would be a rip-off for the private contractors and that safety would be jeopardised. I understand that Mr Livingstone is something of a loner and one whom Ministers might find a slightly uncomfortable associate, particularly as he is equipped with a sense of humour and, from time to time, takes the opportunity to deflate people who take themselves over-seriously and to make their plans look ridiculous. He was, in due course, elected and, disturbingly for the Government, continued to declare that PPP would not work. On 3rd July 2000, he appointed Bob Kiley as Commissioner for Transport. Mr Kiley brought with him a formidable reputation for having redeemed the New York Metro. The Mayor also set up the institution known as Transport for London.
	A paper war followed, the beneficiaries of which were few and far between, as long as one excludes the consultants. I remind your Lordships of Mark Twain's famous remark that the first consultant—having in mind the advice that he gave on the apples—was Satan. Much of the advice that the Government have received in this area has not been good.
	On 13th December, Mr Kiley presented two reports to the Mayor. The first echoed his concerns about PPP; the second was a programme for the rehabilitation and management of the London Underground. On 15th December, the National Audit Office issued a report on certain strategic issues and the contractual framework proposed. I do not have time to say more than that the National Audit Office was not an enthusiastic supporter of the project. A further report by Mr Kiley to the Mayor was issued on 23rd February, based on fuller information as to the shortcomings of PPP. On 4th May, Mr Kiley was appointed chairman of London Transport by the Government. Then a new Secretary of State came along—Mr Byers. At one time I was inclined to see Mr Byers as the villain of the piece. He has been guilty of certain wrongdoing, but in that wrongdoing he has been subordinate to the arch-wrongdoer in this piece, who in my view is the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
	There followed three independent relevant reports, none of which gave comfort to the Government or the supporters of PPP. The Institute of Public Policy Research indicated that there were,
	"significant problems with the Government's current PPP".
	The International Project Finance Association said that the,
	"Government has ignored specialised advice on the scheme's flaws".
	Later, a report on safety by Parsons Brinckerhoff indicated serious shortcomings.
	Meanwhile, on 17th July, some six weeks after he had been appointed, Mr Kiley was sacked. I shall return to that point later. He was sacked partly because he was about to deliver a report by Deloitte & Touche into the shortcomings of the PPP. Having sacked Mr Kiley, the Government immediately took the matter to court to seek an injunction to prevent the report ever appearing in the public sector. The judge made it clear that the court was not ruling on either the safety or the value-for-money aspects of the PPP.
	London Underground sought leave to appeal against Mr Justice Sullivan's ruling that the injunction be lifted. In the event, it was lifted, and the report proved to contain very little of commercial importance. However, it did have certain statements which, obviously, the Government found very embarrassing as they were critical of, and adverse to, PPP.
	This is not the time or the place to discuss the rights and wrongs of the Secretary of State's handling of Railtrack. What can and must be said is that those who are now involved in negotiating the details of financial arrangements may well fight a little shy of a Secretary of State who clearly does not accept that goalposts are intended by those who place them to be fixtures and not easily moveable.
	As I said, Mr Kiley was sacked as chairman of London Transport less than six weeks after he had been appointed and when he was about to present that report. In my view, that move reflected the desperation of the Government. They failed to suppress the report and they can now be seen clearly as having behaved shabbily and rudely towards a man who knew more about the problem than either Ministers or their advisers. It remains to be said that the sacking was carried out in a way which was not only uncivil but downright rude. It was delivered in a letter written by the director general of the department concerned. In it he stated:
	"Accordingly, the Secretary of State has regretfully concluded that you [Mr Kiley] are unable and unfit to continue properly to discharge the functions of Chairman of the Board".
	Those words are usually loaded with insult, and they were on this occasion. I am surprised that a senior civil servant should have allowed himself to be the pawn of a Minister in writing such a letter.
	Of course, the Secretary of State is responsible for that letter. But, as I said, he cannot be seen as much more than a protective barrier erected by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to protect himself from responsibility and from a consequent wave of public opinion should anything go seriously wrong.
	I do not believe that anyone who has served as Minister of Transport can fail to be aware of the way in which the Treasury has always shuddered at the mere thought of railways and of its seeming contempt for managers who, starved of resources, face insoluble problems. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer has become a leading protagonist of such negative attitudes. What he and his advisers should now bear in mind is that London Underground is both necessary and permanent. It will not go away. The sooner the money required to refurbish it is found, the less will be the ultimate cost. The longer the Government and, in particular, the Treasury put off the evil day, the greater will be the ultimate cost. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.

Lord Elder: My Lords, I start by congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, on tabling this Motion and on his success in winning the ballot. I say at the outset that I could not agree with him more that the provision of money for the Underground is a key factor. It seems to be at least ironic that we should be debating the matter in this form now when we have a Government who talk about putting in the sums of money that every government should have been investing over the past 50 years.
	All of us who use the Underground regularly—I have done so for the past 30 years or so—have a vested interest in getting the system back to being one that is comparable with those in overseas capitals. Some are modern and some, like Paris, are quite old. As is the case in relation to so much that was done in the 19th century, as a nation we have been content to use the resources left to us—the water and railway systems are other examples—but we have been far less willing to make the necessary continuing commitment in terms of investment and upkeep. That is as true of the Underground as it is of anything. In the 19th century, it was a world leader, as it was for much of the 20th century. After a further period of low investment and neglect, it has fallen to this Government, and this Government alone, to make the decisive move towards a more modern system.
	The Government have been criticised in certain quarters for going down the road of privatisation when, in fact, they are not doing so. The Underground will still be publicly owned and run. They have been criticised for replicating Railtrack and for putting safety at risk when they are doing neither. London Underground will still run the Tube, and the public sector will remain in charge of safety and will demand the highest standards. It has been said that the whole system should be handed over to Bob Kiley. However, as a national asset—it should be seen as a national and not only a London asset—the Government must retain ultimate responsibility for the system, as clearly and rightly they propose to do.
	I intend to speak briefly today and to concentrate on one key element of the Government's plans; that is, the question of value for money and whether or not the funding method proposed, with private finance, can give value for money when, demonstrably, that means of financing will be more expensive than public borrowing or a bond issue. On paper, that is indisputably the case.
	I have always wanted to believe that the public sector can carry out as cost-effectively and as efficiently as the private sector any major or minor project. But I am afraid that, with a few honourable exceptions, the evidence is that that has not been the case. Cost overruns are the norm, and the best way for the public sector to achieve its objectives on time and to cost are by using the private sector. What should work on paper regrettably does not appear to work in practice.
	Going back 30 years to my time at university, I convinced myself without qualification that the Soviet system worked perfectly on paper. However, experience since then has shown that it came a good deal short of working in practice. The reality is that, with investment on the scale envisaged, we simply cannot afford the sort of cost overrun that we saw occur with the Jubilee Line extension. That extension shows the quality that we want to achieve—that is undoubtedly the case—but not the way in which we should go about it if we want value for money.
	We do not save by having public borrowing rather than private finance if the savings from the cost of the funds are entirely wiped out and more by a cost overrun on the whole budget. I am afraid that that has been the case far too often. It will fall to the private sector to ensure that the risk is managed in a way that will ensure that it manages the investment and invests in the quality of the assets. It will know that if it fails in its job, it will be its profits that will suffer.
	That is a guarantee of the private sector's interest in the project, of the effectiveness of its management, and, as a result, of value for money for the public. That is the whole point of the PPP scheme, and why the Government should be supported in trying to make it work.
	I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has asked Ernst and Young to carry out an independent review of the plans. When the time comes for the National Audit Office to consider what has happened—as it surely will in order to follow up its initial report—the Government will be able to say that their preferred route for the spending of the money, via the private sector, meant that the public indeed got good value for money. We, the regular Underground users, will be able to take pride in what has been achieved.

Baroness Hamwee: My Lords, I must congratulate the Government—that may not be how the Minister expected me to start. However, we all know that the public are interested only in services being delivered; they do not care much what is the structure that underlies those services. So it is a particular achievement of the Government that they have created so much interest in, and opposition to, their proposed arrangements for London Underground.
	That is in part because of the controversy surrounding the public/private partnership. Although we all know—and the noble Lord, Lord Elder, has reminded us—that PPP is not the same as the structure for the national railways, the Railtrack fiasco has dealt a blow to public confidence in the Government getting such things right. I hope that that blow will not be fatal, but the Government seem determined to compound the problem.
	I have an interest to declare—I wish it were more of an interest. I am a member of the Greater London Assembly; I am currently its chair. Our main job is to act as watchdogs over what the Mayor of London does. As regards the Tube, I should prefer to be doing that job on behalf of London's travelling public, its businesses and all its communities, rather than, yet again, finding myself criticising central government because they have not yet handed the Tube over to London's devolved government.
	I could use the whole of my speech, and more, reciting facts about the appalling state of the Tube. I shall not; but I shall give a taster.
	Over a 12-month period in 2000-2001, there were more than 3,500 signal and points failures and no fewer than 14,448 train breakdowns. Research by my honourable friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington tells us that the number of faults on signals, points and track has grown by more than 35 per cent in the past year. In answer to a Written Question in another place, asking how many lines on the Underground were subject to delayed or cancelled services on one day in October, a Minister gave details of incidents which were the cause of "significant" delays—I think that a delay is significant for that purpose only if it is longer than 15 minutes—which amounted to 903 minutes, or more than 15 hours.
	London Underground's annual report, published in August, tells us that it failed to reach customer satisfaction targets set by the Government in seven areas, which include safety, service security and information—no small matters.
	Transport for London's managing director of finance and performance has said publicly that he simply cannot understand why the results of opinion polling among passengers indicate such high levels of satisfaction—contrary, perhaps, to what the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, said. We have tried to explain to him that that is not because passengers are satisfied but because their expectations are so low. Whether passengers are impressed by expenditure on London Underground's current, "Your Tube", advertising campaign—no doubt not cheap—I leave noble Lords to guess.
	The Minister told the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, on 29th October that the Government are "pressing" for swift improvement. Exactly whom are they pressing?
	None of that will improve until the future is settled. I am not 100 per cent supportive of the mayor's action in the matter. I have been openly critical of him for his attacks on London Underground's management. Calling them "dullards", as he did—and, no doubt, other things—has had the inevitable, perhaps intended, effect of some of the most senior management leaving and their posts remaining unfilled. Such events are bound to affect the whole complement. They must feel as if they are not valued—in part, because they do not know what will be their future.
	The future and the date of change remain uncertain. I know that my noble friend Lord Bradshaw will talk more about the possible future financial structure. The Minister told me last month in a Written Answer:
	"The Government's intention is to transfer London Underground Limited to Transport for London after the long-term plans for the modernisation of London Underground's infrastructure have been put in place".—[Official Report, 29/10/01; col. WA 147.]
	Well yes, that much we know. Briefing material that I received for today's debate describes the public/private partnership as being "misconceived from birth". That may not be physically possible, but frankly that is not much more daft than are the Treasury rules which are so artificial and make such a sham of devolution.
	Deloitte & Touche raised crucial concerns about whether the PPP is good value for taxpayers' money, and about the procurement process, which has led to the convoluted contract regime. London Transport sought to suppress publication of that report, and I for one was delighted that the courts took the view that a document of such public concern should, subject to a bit of tippexing out of the identity of the preferred bidders, be in the public domain. In the long term, the courts' support of transparency in such circumstances may be significant.
	Deloitte & Touche is one of the plethora of consultants involved in the saga. We know that the Government have now engaged Ernst & Young to ensure, to cite the Minister:
	"a proper independent and objective assessment . . . of the value for money of those bids".—[Official Report, 29/10/01; col. 1164.]
	I do not know whether the Government do not trust PricewaterhouseCoopers, who are engaged by London Underground for this purpose, or whether they do not trust London Underground, which engaged them. They may be running round hoping that someone, somewhere will give them the answer that they want.
	The Channel 4 News economics correspondent commented that:
	"PPP is supposed to yield efficiency savings. But it also brings uncalculated compliance and monitoring costs. No wonder the civil service spent more than £100 million on consultancy and legal fees, trying to prove it will work".
	The Minister and I both know enough about how lawyers can create paper. The PPP relies on 135 separate contract documents, more than 2,800 pages of contract terms containing—I have no idea who counted this—2 million words.
	As the paper mountain grows, so—despite the lack of dialogue between London Transport and the mayor and his commissioner, Bob Kiley—do concerns about the structure. There were recent threats of strikes on the Underground over facilities available to staff. In the normal world, people would rent a Portacabin. Under the PPP, with its 30-year time frame, they have to provide for maintenance for 30 years, so a Portacabin would cost £250,000.
	From all those contracts, the finance market testing clause stands out as one that should concern us. It provides that, if financing is not available to an infra-co—one of the private companies—or if the infra-co simply does not obtain financing by two months before each seven-and-a-half-year review date, TfL must either review the infra-co's obligations, so that it does not require financing, or pay the infra-co its costs as they are incurred. In other words, TfL must provide the financing itself. I take that to mean that if the infra-cos run out of money, or their backers or shareholders will not provide it, London's council tax payers will have to pick up the bill.
	The cover of the Government's 10-year transport plan is labelled "integrated transport". That is an idea—an ideal—to which we all subscribe. Transport is not integrated in TfL's budget for next year—which, of course, must also take account of future years. I criticise TfL for not including any figure for the cost of the transfer—if the Minister can assure me today that it will be absolutely cost-neutral, I will go away happier than when I arrived—but I can understand its difficulty, as it has not been provided with the financial and performance information for the plan years involved. It simply cannot take account of it because it is not involved in the debate.
	If something goes wrong with PPP, unlike Railtrack the infra-cos will simply lose their contracts. What exit strategy have the Government designed that will protect the public in those circumstances? Can the Minister say, having, still, an open mind about whether PPPs provide value for money and safety—and he assured the House about that—what is the Government's alternative? What is the Government's Plan B?
	Earlier this week the Minister answered a question on turn-out at elections, and he did not need persuading that increasing the reputation of politicians and the political process is an important ingredient. The public believe that far too much of this debate is about personality politics and that the Government are still frankly miffed that they do not have their own candidate in place as mayor. That may not be the case, but it is the perception.
	The public, too, understand that there are occasions when minds need to be changed. There is no shame in that. Indeed, it would do the Government's reputation a lot of good, and London's travelling public would cheer.

Afghanistan

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall repeat a Statement made by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in another place.
	"Mr Speaker, with permission, I would like to make a Statement on events in Afghanistan.
	"It is now clear that the Taliban has been decisively defeated across Afghanistan. Carefully targeted coalition bombing of its front lines opened the way for the Northern Alliance to advance. The fall of Mazar-i Sharif on 9th November was the key to the north. It accelerated defections from the Taliban and allowed General Dostum and Mohammed Atta of the Northern Alliance to cut the lines of communication of the remaining Taliban and Al'Qaeda troops in the north-east.
	"One after another, Taliban positions folded: Taloqan; Baghlan; Bamian. The major city in the west, Herat, fell without a fight, to Ismail Khan. And now we see that the strategy we have pursued is being equally successful in the Pushtun south of the country.
	"Kabul fell without serious resistance on Monday night. Key cities in the Pushtun south have followed Kabul swiftly in falling, including Jalalabad. It is clear that support for the Taliban is evaporating. Though there may be pockets of resistance, the idea that this has been some kind of tactical retreat is just the latest Taliban lie. It is in total collapse.
	"There are reports today that senior Taliban figures in Gardez—including borders Minister Haqqani and intelligence chief Ahmadullah—have surrendered. Kandahar airport has reportedly been taken by anti-Taliban forces.
	"Regrettable incidents have happened, as the liberated people have turned on their oppressors. This should not happen and I appeal to the Northern Alliance and all other forces in Afghanistan to be restrained; to avoid any acts of revenge; and to engage with the UN.
	"I believe the whole House should welcome the progress that has been made. Though conflict is never easy, or nice, to see women and children smiling after years under one of the most brutal, oppressive regimes in the world is finally to understand the meaning of the word 'liberation'.
	"I would like to pay tribute to the outstanding leadership that President Bush has given; and give heartfelt thanks to the British forces involved, now and in the future. There is no greater comfort to the British people than to know that we can call on some of the best armed forces in the world. Their work and their contribution to Britain's strength and international standing is immense.
	"But there remain huge challenges. The military job is not yet done. Bin Laden is still at large. So are his close associates. The diplomatic and political situation remains difficult. The threat of a humanitarian crisis remains.
	"I should tell the House that the United Kingdom will continue to play a full role in the military, the diplomatic and humanitarian tracks of this campaign, the objectives of which remain as set out in the document published in the House Library on 16th October.
	"Our forces, so far, have been involved in the air strikes using Tomahawk missiles and through providing support to US bombers. On the ground, our forces have been involved in liaising with the people of the Northern Alliance, advising them and helping to co-ordinate action.
	"I can confirm to the House that several thousand of our troops are being put on 48-hour notice to move in case they are required in the area. Those include elements from 3 Commando and 16 Air Assault Brigades, including 2nd Battalion, the Parachute Regiment, and 45 Commando Royal Marines, and a range of supporting assets including RAF air transport, support helicopters, engineers, logistic teams and explosive ordnance experts.
	"I cannot give the House full details on how those troops may be used. Consultations with the United States and our other coalition partners continue. The main purpose of those troops would be in the context of multinational efforts to make safe the humanitarian supply routes now opening up as a result of military progress on the ground. Others may be focused on securing airfields and clearing unexploded ordnance; and ensuring the safe return of the United Nations and NGOs to Afghanistan, permitting the construction of the broad-based government that is so badly needed. They will only remain in place for a strictly limited period of time while an international force to work alongside Afghan military commanders is prepared. We cannot of course rule out some of our troops being used in offensive front line operations. 40 Commando Royal Marines remain at a high state of readiness for contingency operations.
	"On the humanitarian front, I should say that an average of over 2,000 tonnes of food a day has been despatched since 4th November. That is four times the rate at the start of October when it was 500 tonnes a day. The WFP is optimistic about reaching its targets: it has despatched over 50,000 metric tonnes of food to Afghanistan since the beginning of October—sufficient for 5 million people for one month.
	"We look forward to the opening of a corridor from the liberated areas to the borders with Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. In particular, the Friendship Bridge between Uzbekistan and Afghanistan will be made safe for the passage of those supplies.
	"The UN and ICRC should now be able to improve delivery of food, healthcare and other assistance to 2 million vulnerable people in the northern region of Afghanistan. Plans are now being made for the international staff of the UN, Red Cross and NGOs to return to Afghanistan. In addition, we will be able to accelerate deliveries to areas in central Afghanistan which will become harder to access as winter sets in so that sufficient stockpiles can be built up closer to the people who need them.
	"That will further reduce the suffering of the Afghan people and show the rest of Afghanistan that life for the entire nation will be better once the Taliban are gone.
	"The advance of the anti-Taliban forces has been assisted by defections from disillusioned supporters. It is time for the rest of Afghanistan—particularly the ethnic groups in the south—to join the uprising against the Taliban and throw off its oppressive rule. The sooner they act, the greater the benefit.
	"The structure of post-Taliban Afghanistan will be for the Afghan people to determine. But we will provide strong diplomatic and economic support to the aspirations of Afghan parties committed to an inclusive, democratic political structure, committed to the welfare of all Afghan men, women and children, and providing substantial local autonomy.
	"I spoke yesterday to Kofi Annan who outlined to me the process that will now follow. The first step will be an early UN-convened meeting of representatives of the various Afghan anti-Taliban groups (including Pushtuns) under the United Nations Special Representative, Mr Brahimi. That would lead to a transitional administration. To support that process under Mr Brahimi, the UN Security Council will be adopting a resolution to underpin the principles on which Mr Brahimi is working.
	"The immediate next step is for the United Nations to establish a presence in Kabul. I am delighted that Mr Vendrell (UN Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan) and Mike Sackett (UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Afghanistan) plan to travel there on Friday. We plan to have a UK diplomatic presence in Kabul by the weekend.
	"I have also spoken today to President Bush and to Chancellor Schroeder. The coalition is as strong today as it has ever been.
	"As I said on 11th September, and have repeated many times since, although there can be no excuses for terrorism we must do what we can to address the causes and the injustices that the terrorists exploit. That is why we want progress towards peace in the Middle East.
	"We must never forget why we are engaged in this action: it is because on 11th September Al'Qaeda perpetrated the worst terrorist outrage in history. It is to bring them to justice, and to eliminate them as a threat to world affairs that we are acting as we are.
	"Today, I have put in the Library an updated version of the evidence document we first published on 4th October. The new document will be translated into Arabic and Urdu and other languages.
	"The intelligence material now leaves no doubt whatever of the guilt of bin Laden and his associates. On 4th October we knew that three of the hijackers were linked to Al'Qaeda. Now we know that the majority were. Indeed, the utterances from his and their own mouths leave no doubt either. Far from hiding their guilt, they gloat. On 9th October one of his spokesmen praised the September 11th atrocities as, 'a good deed' which,
	'transferred the battle into the US heartland'.
	"He warned:
	'The storm of plane attacks will not abate'.
	"Bin Laden himself said on 20th October in an unbroadcast video tape,
	'If avenging the killing of our people is terrorism, let history be a witness that we are terrorists'.
	"Mr Speaker, they are terrorists, and history will judge them as such. Before the history books are written, we will continue to hunt them down until we find them, for as long as it takes.
	"They are guilty. They will face justice and today they have far fewer places to hide and far fewer people who wish to protect them.
	"As we have made clear from the outset, the campaign against terrorism is much more than a military campaign—it is diplomatic, humanitarian, economic, legal. It has meant changing our laws to protect ourselves at home, working with others to protect ourselves abroad.
	"And I say this to the people of Afghanistan: as we hunt down the murdering terrorists hiding in your country, they, not you, are our enemy. This time we will not walk away. Your future is in your hands, but our hands are there in friendship to help you shape that future.
	"The people of Afghanistan have suffered grievously from a brutal regime, from conflict, from famine and from drought. We want to see a country with a government representing all the people of Afghanistan, occupying a proud place in the community of nations, growing economically, enriching its people, liberating their potential. A country that has suffered so much deserves no less.
	"And let us be clear. The way the world embraces and supports the new Afghanistan will be the clearest possible indication that the dreadful events of 11th September have resulted in a triumph for the international community as a force for good, and the defeat of the evil that is international terrorism. A safer world is built out of secure countries representing all their people living in peace with their neighbours. That is how terrorism will eventually be defeated, and that, step by step, must be the new international order that emerges from the worst terrorist atrocity in our history.
	"Whatever the challenges, whatever the setbacks that lie along the way, I believe that is a vision, and a world, worth fighting for".
	My Lords, that concludes the Statement.

Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord for repeating the Statement. It is entirely right that the Prime Minister came to Parliament to deliver it. Does the noble and learned Lord agree that we have seen a complete vindication of the strategy pursued by the coalition over the past four weeks, and indeed, of the wholesome and fulsome support given by these Benches? Had we heeded the cause of those who demanded a pause in the bombing, the coalition would not have achieved the successes it has. Nor would we be any closer to a situation in which effective humanitarian aid could get through. That is now a priority which faces the coalition.
	The Prime Minister has been greatly strengthened by the support of a united Parliament. That broad parliamentary support will be needed in the long haul ahead. Can the Leader of the House give the House an assurance that there will soon be a debate on the Afghan situation and the role of British troops so that the whole question can be debated more fully?
	We meet against a fast-changing political and military background. A major deployment of British troops could now be involved. That alone underlines the importance of further debate. It also reinforces the need for clarity in our purpose. What are our war aims? We began with the aim of destroying Al'Quaeda and bin Laden. Can the noble and learned Lord assure the House that it remains our central aim to pursue not only bin Laden but the whole international terrorist network relentlessly and ruthlessly for so long as it takes until the threat is destroyed?
	To secure bin Laden we set out to remove from power the Taliban which was sheltering him. I am glad to say that that has now been done. The Taliban has been removed from power. Is it also now our aim to remove its capability to do further damage within Afghanistan? Given the welcome collapse of Taliban authority in many Afghan cities, will the coalition now be seeking to harass and destroy Taliban forces in the mountains? Is the Leader of the House in a position to say whether British forces will be involved in that process?
	I join the Prime Minister in paying tribute to the role played by the coalition forces so far, including the role played by our own Armed Forces. We support the decision to place British troops on standby ready to be deployed in Afghanistan should their presence on the ground be required. Can the noble and learned Lord go further and spell out the roles which he envisages will be played by our Armed Forces? I hope that we all agree that their objectives must be clearly defined. We do not want to find our forces indefinitely garrisoning exposed military positions. Can he assure the House that the rules of engagement they are given will allow them to protect themselves in all circumstances? I wonder whether the words in the Statement read to the House by the noble and learned Lord are clear enough in that regard?
	The last thing we need is a power vacuum in which ancient hatreds and rivalries resurface among the people and tribes which now exist in Afghanistan. The need to form a broadly-based administration that can command widespread support has never been more urgent. Can the Leader of the House say more about when he believes that will be achieved? Is he satisfied with the urgency of the United Nations' action in that regard? Can he also tell us at what level the United Kingdom's diplomatic presence will be, and whether he envisages a long-term role for the former king in the future government of Afghanistan?
	Finally, I welcome the comments in the Statement on humanitarian aid. Few will forget the prompt action taken by the British government 10 years ago to help Kurdish refugees in harsh winter conditions. We have a narrow opportunity to act in Afghanistan before the winter. What are we doing now to deliver aid to those in the refugee camps and others displaced from their homes in recent weeks? Does the noble and learned Lord agree that there now has to be an intensive humanitarian effort by all involved to ensure that the aid gets through to those in desperate need? I wonder whether British troops will be used to help in that task.
	It is essential that we do not relent in the fight against international terrorism now that it has begun. We stand four square behind our Armed Forces and the coalition effort. We will continue to do so. I hope that the noble and learned Lord recognises how much we share with the Prime Minister an admiration for the outstanding leadership of President Bush in recent weeks. The unity of purpose has brought us a long way, but there is still a long way to go.

Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, I, too, thank the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House for repeating a Statement made by the Prime Minister. It would be churlish not to recognise the remarkable function and role of the Prime Minister and also of President Bush in what has happened. We also recognise the work of the special forces, both British and American, and their remarkable achievement so far.
	It is worth taking a moment to reflect on the situation which the Soviet Union encountered in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The Taliban disappeared into the mountains, regrouped and returned to stop a Soviet attack which was marked by heavy equipment, a large number of soldiers and the brutal behaviour of those soldiers towards civilians. Is the noble and learned Lord satisfied that reports of the collapse of the Taliban are borne out by intelligence and military information? I recognise that he cannot reveal all he knows, but some of us are concerned because under the Soviet invasion the Taliban previously retreated into the mountains, bogged down almost all of the Soviet armed forces in the mountains and then returned to seize large parts of the country. Is the noble and learned Lord satisfied that it is reasonable to talk about "total collapse"? Does he agree that we should not yet regard the war as over, as the media have begun to describe it, perhaps too soon?
	Secondly, it is vital at this stage to try to win the support of the population of Afghanistan. In that respect, I am concerned by the report that liberated peoples may be visiting their vengeance on those whom they feel to be responsible for their oppression and suffering. One must admit that the record of the Northern Alliance as warriors is outstanding, but as people with a fine sense of civilised values rather less so. There are already troubling reports from Mazar-i Sharif and elsewhere of extreme actions by the Northern Alliance. No doubt part of that is attributed to their success, but part of it is likely to be attributed to inadequate guidance on the way in which they should treat the civilian population. Can the noble and learned Lord assure the House that messages are being received by the Northern Alliance to the effect that it is vital that it needs to win the support of the civilians of Afghanistan, which requires proper behaviour towards them?
	Thirdly, the noble and learned Lord was understandably encouraging about humanitarian aid, which was good to hear. Does he believe that there is any chance of getting aid through to the south? We understand that around Herat, which has fallen, many people are at the edge of starvation. The noble and learned Lord mentioned the centre and the north, and we are grateful for that information, but perhaps he can address that further issue. As regards the food which is being sent to advance positions, are there strategies for fanning it out into the villages which are being cut off, perhaps by air drops, in order to ensure that they receive the food that they desperately need?
	Fourthly, I want to ask the noble and learned Lord a brief question about the rules of engagement, also referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. Will the rules of engagement relating to our own forces permit them to protect civilians in situations in which they may be at risk? The noble and learned Lord will recall the difference between the rules of engagement under which our forces were restrained in Bosnia, where they had no permission to protect civilians, and in Kosovo, where they had. There was then a substantial difference in the role which our troops took. If the noble and learned Lord cannot comment on the rules of engagement, perhaps he will be able to do so on another occasion.
	I turn to the role of the United Nations which the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House, in repeating the Statement, made clear was of vital importance. I want to ask two questions. There has been a report that the United Nations special representative indicated that the transition could last for as long as two years. No doubt that is to allow for the refugees to return and for stability to be established. What steps, if any, have been taken so far to establish an international committee to supervise the setting up of a government of the Afghan people, given that half the population—namely, women—was not represented in the previous government and that there is a great problem of proportionate representation among the tribes, which differ among themselves?
	My final question relates to the refugee camps, mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. We understand that they are still in considerable financial difficulties as regards caring for the refugees, particularly in Pakistan and Iran. Once again, we on these Benches—and we do so frequently—request the Government to consider with the coalition underpinning the financial cost of the refugees in those desperately poor countries in order to show how much we want to support them in their charitable and humanitarian work.

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am truly grateful for what has been said by my two colleagues on the respective Opposition Front Benches. It underlines the fact that anyone who works closely with the Prime Minister recognises what a remarkable man we have at the helm of this country in extremely difficult times.

Noble Lords: Hear, hear!

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I was pleased that both the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, and the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, paid tribute to him. The noble Lord was right to point out, not in a partisan way, that on every occasion we have had the full-hearted support of Mr Duncan Smith. I pay tribute to him also.

Noble Lords: Hear, hear!

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, is right in saying that the successes in swift moving circumstances are a vindication that the Government were right to be resolute not to have a pause. The noble Lord was right in his historical resumé. If there had been a pause, we should not have had the successes. I take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, that they are successes so far and we still have a long journey to negotiate.
	Our purposes have been plain. Our immediate purposes were to bring Osama bin Laden and his fellow criminals to justice; to close down the Al'Qaeda network; and to take action against the Taliban regime which sponsors both. Turning to the questions asked by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, our wider objectives are to end the terrorist threat on Afghan soil; to tackle the machinery—his particular point—of terrorism world-wide; to deal with the immediate humanitarian crisis; and thereafter to help to reconstruct Afghanistan society, including—the noble Baroness's particular point—as broadly based a government as we can assist to be brought about.
	We intend to pursue international terrorism. That is the whole underpinning theme of the legislation which my noble friend Lord Rooker will be introducing. Your Lordships will have to make difficult choices on those occasions. They will have to be faced and they need to be faced while remembering why we are here on such occasions.
	As regards the role of our Armed Forces, the main purpose of any British troops will be in the context of multi-national efforts to make safe the humanitarian supply routes which are now opening up. Some of our troops may be securing airfields, clearing unexploded ordnance, and assisting the safe return of the UN agencies and non-governmental organisations to Afghanistan. However, I repeat what I said earlier—I appreciate that only two of your Lordships had advance copies of the Statement—that we cannot rule out some of our troops being used in offensive front-line operations.
	I know from my previous employment that the rules of engagement are constantly reviewed. The more prudent course, if it is acceptable to your Lordships without being discourteous, would be for me to speak privately to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, and the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, in order to give them appropriate details. I do not believe that it would be wise or prudent, or necessarily right, to go into detail about what our Armed Forces can and cannot do in the difficulties of instant decisions. But of course I accept that the House is entitled to know, and I know that your Lordships will trust the party leaders opposite to receive the material from me.
	The matter is urgent and I do not believe that I could have said anything more focused. We intend to have diplomatic representation in Kabul by this weekend. The United Nations will be there on Friday. If I had read out this Statement and had said that two weeks ago, your Lordships would politely but firmly have come to a certain conclusion about my mental state of health. These are remarkably fast-moving circumstances. In the nature of things, one has to be cautious about coming to conclusions which may soon be vitiated by the alternative track of events.
	The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, asked about the former king. He is part of the equation. We have to work with the United Nations and in particular our international colleagues to give the people of Afghanistan the opportunity to make their choices. If the king features in their choices, essentially that must be a matter for them. But we shall give all assistance we can to whatever proper choices they wish to make.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby, and the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, asked about humanitarian aid. Of course we are eager to assist with the refugee camps. As the ultimate goal, we want people to be able to go to their homes. I am not being complacent. Having told your Lordships recently that we were hoping to reach the figure of 1,700 tonnes, 2,000 tonnes a day is a very considerable achievement in difficult circumstances and in the recent context of three years of drought and decades of civil war.
	Of course one bears in mind what happened when Russia invaded Afghanistan. No one is under the slightest illusion about the magnitude of the task we face. There are troubling reports—I do not know how accurate they are—about atrocities and who caused them. I entirely agree with the noble Baroness. One cannot simply be content to substitute one barbaric tyranny for another. I believe that the messages are getting through. We have a powerful influence far and away beyond our military force. I repeat—it is not a party political point—that no one should under-estimate to the slightest degree the powerful effect that the Prime Minister of this country has had, particularly when mean-minded people urge him for domestic political advantage to attend to domestic matters when he has been doing this country's work magnificently well.
	There is the problem of the south. The Statement was right to concentrate on those areas where we are succeeding. There is much to be done in the south.
	I recognise the validity of the point about aid for refugees and the assistance of the United Nations. I do not think that this country has been ungenerous in either effort or resource and we intend to continue along that path.

Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord for repeating the Statement. Congratulations are richly deserved with regard to the way the Taliban has been dealt with over recent weeks.
	As the noble and learned Lord reminded us, two objectives spelt out some weeks ago remain to be achieved: bringing bin Laden and Al'Quaeda to account. If British Armed Forces are deployed to Afghanistan in pursuit of those objectives, under what command arrangements will they serve? It would be extremely helpful for the House to know exactly what command arrangements may be employed. Will they be entirely national or a mixture of two? What proposals do the Government now have?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, as always I am most grateful to the noble and gallant Lord. He asks a specific question about command and control arrangements. Circumstances have been moving rapidly. The present position is that detailed command and control arrangements have not yet been decided but plainly—I am sure noble Lords will approve of this—we shall be working as closely as may be with the United States and our other coalition partners.

Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, noble Lords will agree that we should be grateful for a Statement which confirms that we can now move on to a more positive, pragmatic and happier stage of this crisis. Can the noble and learned Lord reassure those of us who continue to fear a continuing and long-term cycle of violence in Afghanistan by confirming that our Government have a realistic expectation that the Northern Alliance is reasonably committed to the transitional arrangements which he has outlined? Is it also reasonably committed to a long-term pluralistic government for Afghanistan which includes the Pushtun and other elements representing the population of the south?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am hopeful that that outcome will come about. I think that noble Lords will recognise that it is a mistake to speak of the Northern Alliance as a monolith; quite the opposite. There is a vast amount of work to be done. I have no doubt myself that the only way forward is on an internationally co-operative basis. I hope the House will agree that critical to this Statement is the central importance that the Secretary-General of the United Nations has, the very important role of Mr Brahimi and the fact that everyone at the outset is saying that it must be done on an international basis. But there is no tradition of pluralistic democracy. We have difficulty in getting people to live together in parts of the United Kingdom. It is a long job. We shall have to try to change, encourage, coax and sometimes coerce people—not militarily, I hope—to behave in a civilised way when their past recent history has not been civilised.

Lord Richard: My Lords, perhaps I may ask my noble and learned friend about the state of play with the United Nations. Clearly there will have to be a Security Council resolution setting out the views of the Secretary-General on how matters should now proceed. Can my noble and learned friend tell us when that meeting is likely to take place? In the press this morning I read that one or two people are already saying that the United Nations is being slow about assuming responsibilities in this matter. There has to be Security Council cover for it. It is important that that cover should be obtained quickly.
	It seems to me to be fairly obvious that there has to be some kind of UN direct presence—peacekeeping forces or whatever label one likes to put on it. There will have to be a fair number of soldiers in blue berets in Afghanistan. Do the Government envisage our possible contribution to a peacekeeping force being present in Afghanistan until the UN takes over? It is important that we should get the timing right. I shall be grateful for anything my noble and learned friend can say.

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, again I agree with the thrust of my noble friend's remarks. It may be helpful if I revert to the Statement. It states:
	"The immediate next step is for the UN to establish a presence in Kabul".
	Mr Vendrell—he is, after all, high level; he is the Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan—and Mr Sackett, the UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Afghanistan, will go to Kabul on Friday. If there is reproach against the United Nations for not getting on with things, I respectfully suggest that it is not properly and appropriately levelled.
	Plainly matters are moving very quickly. It is impossible at this stage, and it would be imprudent, to come to absolute conclusions about what our troops will be doing in what circumstances because any prudent commander will weigh up changing circumstances. There is no doubt at all that the United Nations will play a critical role. I repeat one sentence from the Statement:
	"To support this process under Mr Brahimi the UN Security Council will be adopting a resolution to underpin the principles on which Mr Brahimi is working".
	I think that that answers my noble friend's specific question.

Lord Chalfont: My Lords, is the noble and learned Lord aware that gratitude to him for repeating the Statement is bound to be somewhat tempered by the fact that most of the facts and figures, including the identity of the units concerned, was available on the BBC and in the morning papers? Would it not be nice if sometimes Parliament were the first to hear about these things?
	May I ask the noble and learned Lord a perhaps more practical question? Will the earmarking of substantial numbers of British troops to be available for employment in Afghanistan, possibly for some time, have any impact on the earmarking of forces for the European Rapid Reaction Force?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am always sorry if material gets into the public domain before Parliament is aware of it. But I do not believe that anyone could reasonably say that the Prime Minister in the other place, and I as his messenger here, have not been diligent in keeping the Houses fully informed as soon as possible. After all, we invited Parliament to be recalled on three occasions and quite rightly. I do not know how the material got into the public domain. People talk sometimes and when decisions are made not all military men necessarily vow themselves to silence. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, has had experience of such matters in the past. There was certainly no discourtesy intended to Parliament. I hope that the Statement which I read to the House was full and sensibly consistent with the occasion.
	I cannot give a definitive answer on the European Rapid Reaction Force. It may be that the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, was just gently floating a little fly across this particular trout knowing that the trout could not really nibble at it this early.

Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, in view of the changed circumstances in Afghanistan and the fact that the war is clearly now switching more to ground level activity, would it not be possible to scale down the bombing campaign? It has been that campaign, with its inevitable civilian casualties, which has caused opposition among various groupings, and in particular among Muslims, in the past.

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, it is undoubtedly true, and no one should deny the fact, that casualties have occurred and they are deeply regrettable. It is undoubtedly true, as my noble friend says, that that has caused anger and opposition among some sections of our communities. But the fact is that the Taliban is on the run because of the bombing. It is also the fact that we are now able to move in 2,000 tonnes of food every day because of the bombing.

Lord Judd: My Lords, perhaps I may associate the Back Benches on this side of the House with the tributes that have been paid to the Prime Minister for his leadership, to the British Armed Forces and I hope also to the humanitarian workers who now have a vast task ahead of them because the race against the winter is going to be very tough indeed.
	Further to the question asked by my noble friend Lord Richard, can my noble and learned friend clarify one point? I am sure that we all take great heart from the emphasis which is being put on the role of the United Nations and the work with it. Can we be assured that the deployment of British troops pending the arrival of a UN presence in any form is itself authorised specifically by the United Nations and the action that the Security Council has taken?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, within the bounds of international law, we are entitled legitimately to carry out the action that we have taken in Afghanistan. As I have said on previous occasions—I hope that I shall not bore the House too much—Article 51 gives the right to self-defence and there is also Article 5 of the NATO treaty. Indeed, two specific United Nations resolutions were passed post 11th September. But I want to reassure my noble friend by referring again to the words of the Statement. It states:
	"The first step will be an early United Nations convened meeting of representatives of the various Afghan anti-Taliban groups (including Pushtuns) under the UN Special Representative, Mr Brahimi".
	I am happy to repeat that.

Lord Elton: My Lords, the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House, my noble friend Lord Strathclyde and the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby, are all right to warn against premature euphoria. I remember that Napoleon thought that he had beaten the Russians when they evacuated Moscow. The Russians later defeated him because of his immensely extended lines of communication and a very severe winter. The difference in this case is the enormous lifting power of air forces.
	Every time the Prime Minister has made a major pronouncement on these affairs, he has rightly drawn attention to the necessity to adjust the world order after these events in order to see that they do not recur. I heartily agree with that. But it is not necessary to await the end of the campaign which may continue for some time yet in Afghanistan in order to start planning the nature of that re-ordering and the means of achieving it. I wonder whether the Leader of the House can tell us what steps are being taken to make that preparation and to take Parliament into the deliberative stages of it?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am most grateful. There are a number of different aspects here which need to be looked at discretely. First, what can we do domestically to deal with terrorism? We have been derelict for far too long because we have not pursued resources and financial assets and we have not necessarily had the full and appropriate equipment in the criminal law. That is an aspect which is going to be dealt with in significant part, I hope, if Parliament agrees, in the anti-terrorism legislation, which will be with us very soon.
	Secondly, what has the Prime Minister been able to do by influence rather than by realpolitik power; in other words, the power of argument and personality rather than the power of battalions? What has he been able to do to change the world agenda? I entirely agree with the noble Lord that it is early days, but I believe that he has made a very significant start. But one country cannot do it alone. It seems to me that the wider context must inevitably lie with the United Nations. If we want an ordered international regime there is one body which has been available for a very long time now, but perhaps has been insufficiently used. That is the third aspect to which I draw attention.

Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the Minister reassure me on what may seem to be a small point? I know that the marine commandos are accustomed and equipped for winter warfare when training in Norway, but there is talk of putting 20,000 of our troops into Afghanistan in winter. Do we have the equipment for them so that they can maintain themselves in that appalling climate?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I shall not speculate about the risk to other people because I do not believe that is right. I shall not speculate about numbers. It is quite plain that it would not be right for any government of this country or any commanders of its Armed Forces to deploy troops who were not adequately equipped to carry out their operations in such dangerous circumstances.

The Earl of Erroll: My Lords, why is there secrecy about the rules of engagement? All the troops will have to know what they are, so they will soon become public knowledge. Am I right in believing that there is now a human rights dimension which controls the behaviour of individual troops? Therefore, does the noble and learned Lord agree that this aspect needs very careful scrutiny and examination?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, obviously, the rules of engagement are always scrutinised very carefully because they have to be compliant with our international legal obligations. That is a duty on the British Government. In any event, it would be unacceptably irresponsible to commit troops without clear rules of engagement which protected them and on two bases; first, so that they were plainly acting lawfully; and, secondly, that they had sufficient protection for themselves.
	Of course, in due time it may that the rules of engagement will filter out, but I do not believe it is my work and job to assist any potential enemy of this country by talking about matters at this stage when they should be kept a good deal more confidential.

The Earl of Sandwich: My Lords, the Statement mentioned the return of the non-governmental organisations. That will be widely welcomed especially if passage is made safe for humanitarian assistance. But have the Government considered the contribution that the NGOs could make to civil society on a temporary basis, particularly as the people of Kabul are not enamoured with the present authorities?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the noble Earl is quite right. Plans are being made at the moment for the international staff of the United Nations, the Red Cross and the NGOs to return to Afghanistan. Plainly, they will be carrying out essential work for the attempted construction of post-Taliban civil society.

Viscount Waverley: My Lords, in the past, British assistance to the office of the United Nations Special Representative in Islamabad has always been appreciated. Will the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House be sympathetic to future manning requests?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: Yes, my Lords, in principle. Of course, one looks at the practicalities and at resources, but that is the thrust of our policy.

Lady Saltoun of Abernethy: My Lords, have our troops been provided with adequate clothing and equipment for winter conditions in Afghanistan?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I have attempted to deal with that point. No British government and no British commanders are going to put men in positions of danger without their being properly equipped. I shall not go into any further detail. To do so would be irresponsible.

Lord Powell of Bayswater: My Lords, will the Minister confirm that even when bin Laden and Al'Qaeda have been tracked down and brought to justice in Afghanistan, the Government's commitment to take action against other terrorist groups and other governments who protect them will not in any way slacken? Will he also confirm that, if necessary, military means would be contemplated in dealing with those situations as well?

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the noble Lord has enormous experience of these matters. He is quite right. He has had recent experience of some regimes which have had indifferent histories in the context of terrorism. We cannot stop merely having taken action in Afghanistan. It would be a betrayal of all our efforts. This will be a long haul, as the United States administration has said and as the Prime Minister has repeated on so many occasions. In response to the noble Lord's second question, it seems to follow that if we are entitled lawfully to use force, that can never be an option that we can exclude.

Lord Rea: My Lords, following the trend of the question from the noble Lord, Lord Elton, will my noble and learned friend assure us that the great success of the coalition in toppling the Taliban will not deflect from the need to act on some of the contributory causes to the act of terrorism that took place in New York? I refer in particular to the situation in the Middle East and to the statement by the President and the Prime Minister that a Palestinian state should be founded and that we should accelerate negotiations towards that end.

Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, a distinct section of the Statement made exactly my noble friend's point; namely, that it is critically important to continue with Middle East peace efforts. It seems to many of us in all parts of the House that there is an opportunity at the moment which, if lost, is unlikely to recur, and that the dynamic of our times is moving very quickly indeed.

London Underground

Debate resumed.

Lord Fowler: My Lords, I begin by congratulating my noble friend Lord Peyton on initiating the debate and on his devastating analysis of the Government's plans. I followed directly behind the noble Lord as Conservative Transport Minister—albeit there was a gap of five years between us due to some "electoral leaves on the track" between 1974 and 1979.
	I had one advantage over my noble friend. When I arrived, the Department of Transport was a separate department and not part of the Department of the Environment. In that, the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, followed the example and policy of the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan. Frankly, that is a better way of organising transport at the Whitehall level than the decision made in 1997 to include transport in the giant Department for the Environment, Transport and the Regions. I do not think that transport benefited from that decision. Transport policy is one of the most important areas of national policy, and London Underground is of crucial importance in that regard.
	Perhaps I may make four brief points. First, I believe that we should recognise the fundamental importance of London Underground. The system has vast potential. We are fortunate that the Victorians had not only the foresight but also the enterprise to invest in the way they did. The urgent task now is to develop a system for the 21st century.
	No one can conceivably doubt that need. London's roads are already clogged up. New houses and flats are being built in the centre of London, which will make some roads near to impassable. We are told—and I agree—that good public transport is the answer. But we all know the reality. Trains are often overcrowded and dirty and rolling stock is often out of date. Stations are often inadequate to serve the public. The new Underground station at Westminster is an example of what can be achieved, but regrettably there are not many examples of that kind. And services are frequently unreliable, even on new lines. The point was made from the Liberal Democrat Benches that on October 23rd there were 15-hour delays across all 10 Underground lines. That is the worst-ever figure ever on record in the history of London Transport. It included three and a half hours of delay on the new Jubilee Line extension. One can only imagine the impact that that had on hundreds and thousands of travellers in London. In short, I do not believe that anyone can be remotely satisfied with the service as it stands.
	My second point relates to the need for new investment. There is no conceivable doubt about that. Investment under both governments has been inadequate. Ministers speak of the previous Conservative government as though something happened that was peculiar to that period; but I remember taking over as Transport Minister after a period of capital cuts under the preceding Labour government. Looking back makes for an arid debate. We should concern ourselves with going forward; and we should note where the debate has now taken us. Next to no one now believes that we should leave this matter to the Treasury. As my noble friend Lord Peyton said, it is the belief of almost everyone that some new means of funding is urgently required. That is why the previous Conservative government pursued privatisation options—which in my view had significant advantages. That is why Mr Livingstone and Mr Kiley have proposed the bond option, based on the United States' experience. I can see some advantage in that.
	But the Government have embraced neither of these options. They have set out on a course of their own— namely, contracting out. They do not call it "contracting out"; they call it "public-private partnership", but contracting out is exactly what it is. They intend to ask the private sector to take responsibility for the maintenance of both the infrastructure and the trains. Their argument is that,
	"London Underground is a transport operator, not a construction and maintenance specialist".
	That is precisely the argument that I used in the 1980s, when contracting out ancillary services inside the health service such as cleaning and catering. But I have to pose the question: are construction and maintenance on a par with ancillary services in the National Health Service?
	The Government have even gone a stage further in their argument on the benefits of their position. According to one of their Ministers, Mr Keith Hill, who was then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the DETR, the Government were providing,
	"a much more unified system".
	I have to say that this is not the universal view about what the Government are providing. Indeed, I cannot think of anyone outside the ranks of government Ministers who has even advanced that case.
	That brings me directly to my third point, and to my most fundamental criticism of the Government's proposals. Putting operations in one set of hands, and all the other functions in another, seriously weakens the management of the whole system. Who is in charge? Who takes responsibility? Where does the buck stop? All those are questions one should ask about any management organisation. We all know what will happen if there are difficulties; the operating side will blame the track side and vice versa. The position will be made no easier by the fact that one part is in the private sector and another part is in the public sector. My central fear about the Government's plans is that that is a recipe for internal conflict. That division of responsibility seems to me to be the fatal flaw in the whole plan. To divide in the way the Government are dividing is, frankly, a curious way of running a railroad. That applies to a railroad whether it is above the ground or below it.
	The Government say that this is not a repeat of what happened with Railtrack. I am glad to hear that because although I am a confirmed privatiser I was never in favour of the division I mentioned. I notice that the Minister smiles wryly at that. However, before he smiles too broadly, I think he will agree that you can be in favour of reform although not all the detail, as that is precisely the position of the parliamentary Labour Party in the other place with regard to the Government's proposals on the reform of the House of Lords.
	I remember putting my criticism about the division between the operating side and Railtrack before a very senior civil servant who replied that my solution—which was a different solution—was romantic. Doubtless those same civil servants are now writing briefs showing how their plans could never have worked in the first place.
	Finally, as a frequent user of the Tube, I observe that the Government have said little, virtually nothing, about the culture of management of London Underground. Perhaps we are so content with the management of London Underground that we believe no improvement is possible. Perhaps we are so content with the industrial relations position that we believe that no improvement is possible. If that is the case, it does not entirely co-incide with my view as a customer—if that is how I am seen and I sometimes doubt it—at the local level faced with too frequent threats of industrial action. Figures on that are difficult to come by. The same Mr Hill, who was Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the time of the creation of this unique, unified system, stated in a Written Answer on 9th April:
	"Information on the number of staff days lost due to industrial action could be provided only at disproportionate cost".—[Official Report, Commons, 9/4/01; col. WA 384W.]
	Most of us who have had any experience of government recognise only too well the defensiveness of that Answer.
	My overwhelming feeling about the Government's proposals is that they constitute a lost opportunity. Perhaps it is inevitable that they will not accept any privatisation scheme, even the kind I favour such as the one I introduced with the National Freight Corporation in which staff were given a stake in the business or even, for example, the successful Docklands Light Railway scheme. However, if that is not to be adopted, I believe that there are advantages in the bond proposal. At the very least it gives the opportunity not only to generate new finance but also strong management and it is strong management that this system needs. I suggest that what will not work is the kind of divided management responsibility which the Government support. It is a system which provides inbuilt conflict and, frankly, that is the last thing we want. My fear is that if the Government continue down that track, in spite of all the advice to the contrary—goodness knows, there has been a whole deluge of advice to the contrary—we shall be back here in a few years debating yet again the future of the London Underground. That would be a tragedy and would constitute a missed opportunity for reform.

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, for providing us with the opportunity to debate this matter. The debate is fundamentally about underfunding which applies to so many of our public services, not solely the London Underground.
	Of course there have been a whole variety of delays in injecting the additional investment that is required in our public services. We on our side of the House acknowledge that. However, I think everyone must accept that we at last have a government who endeavour in a variety of ways to put right—to use the words of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton—the wrongdoings of the past. The Government are injecting long overdue investment into education and health. They have also raised transport investment in the order of national priorities and have given it a significance which, frankly, even when the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, was in office, it did not enjoy. Both the Prime Minister and the Chancellor—I emphasise that point—are to be not so much criticised but congratulated on the strong leadership which they have given in this area, in particular in the run-up to the general election in June where we set out our policies very clearly indeed. The choices between the different parties were made available for the public to see. Of course, those were fully endorsed in a most resounding way in the general election result.
	First, investment in our public services has to come from a variety of sources, not solely taxation. I do not believe that anyone, even our friends the Liberal Democrats, would argue that it should come solely from taxation. It is important that the Government and all of us continue to explore all the avenues open to us to secure the maximum return for that purpose. I am one of the limited group—to use the phrase of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton—who are prepared to speak up for public-private partnerships, unpopular though that may be in some quarters. I say that because I believe that PPPs exist in a variety of different forms. I do not think that one size fits all. The IPPR report, to which the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, referred, concluded—if it is read carefully—that broadly it was in favour of PPPs, but strongly made the point that each needs to be structured to address the particular problems which it is trying to resolve. That is what I urge the Government to do.
	I speak on this topic with a little unique experience. I declare an interest as I am now a government appointed non-executive director of the recently established PPP for National Air Traffic Services Limited. That matter was subject to a good deal of debate in both Houses and, unlike the proposed PPP for the Underground, was attacked as a privatisation. From my experience, having now seen that PPP established since 28th July, I can say that in no way is that new organisation a privatised corporate entity and neither will the PPP which is envisaged for the London Underground be such a body. NATS has seen a substantial injection of private capital which was badly needed and investment on a scale that has not been seen for too many years. Most European air traffic management systems are similarly underfunded and gravely short of capital investment. That is a cause for concern for all of us. Here at last we now have a system which at least guarantees investment flows in the coming years.
	Secondly, some private sector skills have been brought to bear. In light of my previous experience in the public sector, I know that that has started to produce changes that have long been needed. People from the former NATS—it is now NATS Ltd—say that they have wanted for several years to address those changes but have been unable to do so; they are embracing the changes with much alacrity. They are bringing rigour and discipline to the management structure and the organisation. That can be uncomfortable—it has proved to be so initially—but in my view the approach will bear fruit in the longer term. Benefits will flow primarily from the introduction of the PPP set-up. In the short-term, there are unexpected but substantial problems relating to NATS operations. They could not be foreseen or taken account of in any business plan—they relate entirely to the unfortunate events of 11th September, which have thrown us off course. Regrettably, the tragedy earlier this week in New York will not have helped—it will have adverse effects on the operation of the PPP.
	Notwithstanding those difficulties, the organisation is responding positively. A close and supportive relationship is developing between all those involved—my main message today is that they are endeavouring to build a proper partnership. We have to consider different structures for PPPs and have a positive approach with regard to building relationships between all the relevant parties.
	What has probably impressed me most about the new organisation is its commitment to maintaining the previous safety standards within NATS and to considering ways in which those standards might be made even more demanding. Safety is truly paramount in that PPP. If we get the structures right, there is no reason that that will not similarly be the case with regard to the Underground.
	If the coming value-for-money tests are passed, the public will expect investments and they will want improvements in service to start to be apparent. People want the quality of their travelling life in London to be improved; they do not want a continuing political wrangle.
	If the proposed PPP contracts had been put in place on 1st April 2001, would not an extra £5 million have been injected every day since that date into the Underground's infrastructure? Secondly, for how long is the injection of that investment in the London Underground system likely to be deferred? Thirdly, might the mayor of London take legal action when the value-for-money tests have been concluded? If so—if there continues to be no movement in that regard—does the Minister agree that that would be an outrage to the travelling public in London? Finally, if the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, were with us, I should implore her to continue her efforts as chairman of the GLA to ensure that we bring this wrangle to a conclusion as soon as possible, so that we can start to ensure that London Underground travellers get the service that they so richly deserve.

Lord Ezra: My Lords, I am very pleased to follow the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, because I recently appeared before his sub-committee in relation to energy security.
	To my certain knowledge I can affirm that for the past 15 years—possibly for very much longer—we have regularly addressed the subject of the Underground. We have done so by asking Questions, in debates and in other forms. The reason for that continued interest involves the abiding problem—the basic problem—of under-investment. However, the situation was worse than that. I remember an occasion when a previous government decided on a three-year plan for investment, which was somewhere near the level that was required not only for current maintenance but also for future investment. However, in the immediately succeeding year, the plan was cut. It is no surprise that in those circumstances management was demoralised and many of the best people left. Inadequate and uncertain investment led to inadequate management.
	The present Government have recognised that problem; as the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, pointed out, there is no doubt about that. They have accepted that an adequate flow of investment over an adequate period of time is needed—they are committed to an investment of £13 billion over 15 years. The noble Lord, Lord Peyton, to whom we are indebted for this debate, and other noble Lords have frequently discussed the way in which that is to be done. The simplest way would have involved an injection of government funds that were properly accounted for or the money could possibly have been raised in the City on the basis of bonds, as has been done successfully in the United States. However, the Government chose an alternative route, which has been the subject of continued debate and which has led to unfortunate delays in getting investment into the Underground. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, drew attention to that.
	In the mean time, it is regrettable that the system has continued to decline. As the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, pointed out, the number of delays that are due to signal failure and points failure has increased. We are faced with a situation in which, although everyone agrees that more investment and determined management are required, the system continues to deteriorate.
	How could that be put right in the present circumstances? I should like to put a few questions to the Minister. First, on the face of it, the PPP is apparently going to introduce a system of divided responsibility. Everyone agrees that if the management of such an important enterprise as London Underground is to work successfully—indeed, this applies to any enterprise—it needs to be unified; there needs to be somebody who is in control. In the circumstances of the PPP as the Government presently envisage it, how is that unified management control to be achieved? That is the first point on which we should like some reassurance.
	Secondly, there is the question of accountability. To whom are the infra-cos going to be accountable? To whom is London Underground going to be accountable? Will they be accountable to Transport for London or to the Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions? The noble Lord, Lord Elder, suggested that accountability could continue to involve the government department. We need to be clear about that.
	Unified responsibility is a matter about which we want to know, and accountability is another. Accountability is going to be a complex matter so far as the infra-cos are concerned. As my noble friend Lady Hamwee pointed out, no fewer than 135 different documents have dealt with the issue. They raised all kinds of ways in which the infra-cos will have to deliver under their contracts. Nearly 2 million words have been written. How is this mass of material to be translated into practice, and who is to go through it in order to see that the infra-cos do what they are committed to do? Therefore, we need some clarification on the question of accountability.
	Thirdly, how will this tie in with the responsibility of the mayor to introduce "a safe, integrated, efficient and economic" transport system for London, having regard to his misgivings about the whole system? It does not appear to augur very well for the PPP that ultimately it should be put in the hands of someone who is fundamentally opposed to it. How is that problem to be resolved?
	I believe that I have referred to some of the basic issues which confront us. We all want to see an effective solution to the problem of London Underground. We all agree with the Government that extra funding on a consistent annual basis is required so that not only current funding but future investment requirements are met. But we still have doubts about how that is to be achieved for all the reasons which have been deployed in the debate so far.

Baroness Gardner of Parkes: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Peyton for initiating this very interesting debate. I note that the debate is concerned with London Underground's future, not its past. The future is inextricably linked with the present. In order to plan for the future we must study what is happening in London now. We cannot look at the Underground in isolation; it is part of the London transport system. We have heard today about closures and delays lasting hours on the Underground. Increasing numbers of passengers use London Underground. Whereas there was once a morning and evening peak hour, today there is never a slack period on the Underground. At whatever time of day one travels on the Underground, there is barely a seat to be had.
	I do not know whether the trains are learning from buses. Unfortunately, trains have developed elephant-style timing and arrive in clumps, which never happened. Today, two or three trains may arrive at one or two-minute intervals followed by an eight-minute break. I am aware that there have been a good number of station closures, real emergencies and hoaxes. I know also that escalators are being replaced at many stations. Like the holes in the road referred to by my noble friend Lord Peyton, escalator replacements appear to go on for ever. We have also heard about signal failures. I believe that too much money is spent on refurbishing and glamorising the interior of Underground stations when passengers would much prefer to have more train services and greater reliability.
	Buses are very important. I have just seen a report of 96 pages dated October 2001 commissioned by Westminster City Council entitled West End Entertainment Impact Study. That report deals with the problem of getting people out of the centre of London at night. Unfortunately, it makes clear that the Underground cannot possibly run 24 hours a day, which would be desirable, because most of the maintenance is done at night. Whether it is possible to reduce that problem without the Underground I do not know, but it is essential to have adequate replacement transport during those hours.
	In the West End there are 2,350 premises licensed to sell liquor, and 128,000 music and dancing venues. The Coventry Street pedestrian flow peaks between 11 p.m. and midnight, but there are more people on the street between 4 a.m. and 5 a.m. than during the morning rush hour. How to deal with that great influx of people is a very serious problem.
	London is a national centre for tourism, but the West End—the very heart of the city—is the destination of 95 per cent of visitors to the capital. The number of licensed premises per square mile is greater than any other place in the United Kingdom, continental Europe or North America. There is a trend towards larger bars which support even greater numbers of people. It is essential to be able to deal not only with all the people who want to travel to London for entertainment but the staff who service those premises. Staff must travel to and from work, often at very anti-social hours, and at present they rely heavily on late night buses. There is a need for change in that area. Instead of Trafalgar Square being the only centre for buses, there should be other areas where people can access more transport facilities. In the view of many people, London is a 24-hour world city. Many clubs discharge up to 60,000 people between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. every day.
	Many of the methods which are intended to get people around London do not really work. As to cameras in bus lanes, I am delighted that there is now greater enforcement. It is no good having bus lanes unless they are enforced. On many occasions one sees a bus lane completely obstructed by a parked vehicle, even with its hazard lights on. It prevents taxis and buses from using that lane.
	But there is no point in having bus lanes unless there are buses to use them. When I was a member of the Greater London Council one of the objectives was to decide whether an area was suitable for a bus lane. Unless a certain number of buses per hour used a particular lane, traffic was allowed to be more free flowing. I believe that we should look at the possibility of allowing cars containing more than three people to use bus lanes. We should also think about whether there is a way in which minicabs can identify themselves after they become a registered form of transport in London. Noble Lords will be aware that for many years I was closely involved in the legislation involving minicabs. At last, by 2002 all minicabs in London will be registered and standards will improve.
	It would also be good if in some way people could be speeded along. We have gone mad and narrowed every street and restricted speeds. I am all for restricting speed, but there are a number of humps and bumps. There have been debates in your Lordships' House about the danger and damage done to ambulances and police cars which must travel at a certain speed. I believe that people want traffic that is cleaner and moves faster. By "faster" I do not mean more speed but the ability to move in a better way. The bus lane from Heathrow has been amazingly effective, in that it has narrowed the traffic in that area to just two lanes. Whereas three lanes funnelled into two, now the bus lane has automatically slowed traffic and prevented the awful jam that one experienced all the time.
	There is a need to do other things. I believe that a tunnel under Hyde Park to take traffic from north to south would be a good idea. Nowadays, toll roads are common—I saw them in Melbourne—and that may be a favourable way to deal with these matters.
	There need to be improvements in the phasing of traffic lights. If one travels along Great George Street towards Parliament Square one knows that during each phase only three or four cars will get through. I believe that a change of only one or two seconds will make for more free flowing traffic. Above all, we need a quick decision in favour of CrossRail.
	I was involved in your Lordships' House with the Jubilee Line extension. At that time Wilfred Newton was the chairman of London Transport. He told me that when he built the Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway the whole thing was up and built in much less time than it took for the legal processes of getting planning permission for the Jubilee Line extension. So people should not be surprised that it took that long, cost that much and that there were so many delays.
	The procedure was bad in those days when transport issues came as private Bills through your Lordships' House. Now there is a public inquiry procedure for transport matters, it can be much worse. I feel horrified that the Terminal 5 decision has been delayed yet again. I conclude by saying that I am worried about PPP. My noble friend Lord Fowler mentioned the National Health Service experience of PPP. It has been totally disastrous and expensive. We have mortgaged the future of the National Health Service. We should not do the same for London Underground.
	The noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, spoke strongly in favour of PPP. Of course I was not surprised about that after the noble Lord told me that he was a member of such a board. How could he be anything but supportive of that idea? The noble Lord was certainly giving a prejudiced view of it. He said that all the people involved were "building relationships between all the parties involved". That is all very well. I do not mind them doing that. But I want to see some real results and not just spending time windmilling everything around among themselves. I therefore was not too cheered by his remarks.
	The noble Lord referred also to the value for money tests being approved. I am sceptical about that because we hear regularly at Question Time that a report on the money side is being suppressed. As a member of the public I automatically react unfavourable to that. I ask: why is the report not being made public; why is it being suppressed? It is essential that we do everything we can to make life better for people who live and work in London. The Underground is a most important part of that.
	As the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, said, we have had a continuing problem of under-investment. Over the years we have been to lunches together at London Transport. We have been told that one of its major difficulties is having a short-term budget that enables it only to plan year by year instead of being able to make long-term plans. There is a real need to know where one stands financially. I am sorry to say that I do not think that PPP is the way to do it.

Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, I join others in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, on initiating the debate today. Two weeks ago, in our debate on the railways, I drew attention to the fact that there are now eight former Secretaries of State for Transport in this House on the Benches opposite. Today, we have had the pleasure of hearing from two of them. In the railway industry the period of office of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, is looked back on as something of a golden age. It was the one occasion when the department managed to take on the Treasury and largely win many of the battles.
	This is a timely debate. It gives us the opportunity to make clear how very different are the Government's plans for London Underground, compared with what has happened with Railtrack. The critical question that we must ask is whether the Government are in danger of repeating with the Underground the massive mistakes that their predecessors made in the privatisation of the railways.
	A week last Friday I attended a public meeting on transport convened by the Wimbledon Civic Forum. It was a strictly non-party political occasion, at which about 100 residents discussed these issues in an unemotive but concerned way, with the help of speakers from the SRA, from Transport for London and the Railway Forum. It was clear that those present equated the Government's plans for the Underground with what the Conservatives did to Railtrack and that as a consequence there was strong opposition to the PPP.
	The Wimbledon audience was not aware, for example, that the Government had considered, and rejected, a not-for-profit trust as an option for modernising the Underground. It also did not appreciate how the Government are determined to give absolute priority to safety, with the Health and Safety Executive given responsibility for enforcing a double lock on safety.
	At the end of the evening—I stayed fairly quiet while all this went on—I felt like recalling Oscar Wilde's complaint after the first night of "Lady Windermere's Fan" in 1982, which was:
	"The play was a great success, but the audience was a total failure".
	That brought home to me how much work the Government have to do in winning over opinion for their proposals. I must say to the party opposite that people hardly believe a word of what the Conservative Party says on transport issues because of the Railtrack legacy. Indeed, they recall that until just before the recent general election the Conservative Party favoured outright privatisation of the London Underground. It proposed breaking up the Tube into five groups of lines and then selling them off for ever.
	I understand that that is no longer Conservative policy. I look forward to hearing from the noble Viscount, Lord Astor, what they believe should replace outright privatisation.
	Much as I dislike having to admit it, Londoners tend to believe what Mr Livingstone and Mr Kiley have to tell them on these subjects. I notice that they have become rather improbable heroes of the Benches opposite.
	Let us remind ourselves what is the London Underground problem. For decades the Underground has not been properly funded. To make matters worse, government funding was chopped and changed from year to year, so that Tube managers could not invest effectively. From 1979 to 1997 average core investment was just £395 million a year. So by 1997 there was a massive investment backlog. Since 1997 core investment in London Underground has increased to around £530 million a year—better than before, but still not enough.
	With economic growth and increased tourism, overcrowding, as the noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, has said, is a daily problem, as those of us who use the Tube know only too well. It is not just a question of rush hours, it is all day long. Too many trains are still cancelled. One in 20 peak trains do not run. That produces awful knock-on effects for other services. Broken escalators take too long to fix. Some stations have been neglected almost since the day they were built. So everyone agrees that the Tube needs massive investment to bring it up to modern standards.
	As things are, London Underground projects are often late and suffer huge cost overruns. The Jubilee Line extension was two years late. It is still not running at full capacity despite a cost overrun of £1.4 billion. We are all familiar with the "signalling problems in the Canary Wharf area" excuse as the reason for delays and cancellations as we try to get here to Westminster. London Underground enhancement works currently overrun by an average of 20 per cent on budget. Even allowing for a lower overspend on simple maintenance works, that amounts to some £2 billion over the next 15 years.
	Therefore, the choice is either between the Government and the taxpayers keeping the risk and passing it on to passengers and London taxpayers, with funding dependent on the good will of the Treasury, or the PPP approach with government and taxpayers sharing the risk of overruns and delays with the private sector and achieving steady investment. It is not as if London Underground is not already working in partnership with the private sector. A forerunner of the PPP was put in place on the Northern Line. Trains now are far more reliable thanks to the new maintenance regime operated jointly by London Underground and its private sector partners.
	On the Docklands Light Railway, the £200 million PPP delivered the Lewisham link two months early and on budget in 1999. Another PPP is planned to link the DLR to London City Airport. The PPP proposals bring in the first committed long-term investment programme of £13 billion over 15 years for the Underground, with higher public sector support than ever before. PPP companies will be paid by results and charged for poor performance. To reduce risk and avoid penalties the companies therefore invest as early as possible in the most reliable systems and technology. This is not a Railtrack-style privatisation. The public sector will run the trains and deliver the service to the public, as well as own the network.
	During the travelling day, around 12,000 London Underground staff will run the system. At night, thousands of workers in consortium companies will do what the private sector does well, which is to manage maintenance and construction work efficiently and effectively. Some of the biggest and most respected construction and engineering firms in the world are among those bidding to work on the London Underground PPP.
	What do we hope can be delivered? First, the public sector will continue to own and operate the Tube. The Tube map, travelcard and integrated services will all remain in place. Private sector companies will be contracted to carry out maintenance and upgrades to tracks, signals, stations and other infrastructure. That should mean that services will be faster and more frequent. Fewer breakdowns and delays will take place and thus services will become more reliable. The PPP will also update the technology—today around one-half of all train cancellations are caused by equipment failures. The public sector will co-ordinate the works. For example, one would not see both the Northern and Victoria Lines closed at the same time for upgrade work, which is the kind of problem that has been encountered in the past.
	Every train on the Underground will be replaced or refurbished over the course of the PPP. Similarly, every London Underground-owned station will be refurbished or modernised over the next seven-and-a-half years. Over the first five years of the contract, 52 out of 255 stations will be fully modernised. Congestion problems will be tackled at overcrowded stations such as Leicester Square and Brixton.
	Safety and security should be improved. The independent Health and Safety Executive will continue to ensure safety on the London Underground. Many more stations will be fitted with security cameras, while every carriage will carry CCTV for passenger safety. Fares will continue to be set by the elected Greater London Authority under the mayor. The PPP does not require fares to rise faster than inflation.
	Because of the great ignorance as regards the Government's proposals, I hope that my noble and learned friend will be able to confirm that my understanding of the PPP is broadly correct. First, given that the PPP is based on fixed-term contracts rather than permanent transfers to the private sector, assets should return to the public sector after they have been upgraded. Secondly, the PPP will retain clear public sector accountability from the outset. It will put Transport for London firmly in charge of the overall planning of the service and will ensure that the public sector London Underground retains statutory safety responsibility for the whole network.
	Thirdly, private companies will maintain and upgrade the network for the period of the contract, but public sector London Underground will run the whole network. Fourthly, no separation will be made between train and track infrastructure maintenance. We shall see no equivalent of Railtrack, where that company was responsible for track and signalling on the one hand, while separate companies were responsible for the trains on the other. For each Tube line, one company will be responsible for the maintenance of both trains and infrastructure.
	All that should mean that the PPP will provide exactly the kind of integration in maintenance that disappeared from the railway with privatisation. The companies will be responsible for fulfilling contracts for the maintenance and modernisation of infrastructure and rolling stock. Thus every aspect of the London Underground system with which travellers come into contact will be in the hands of London Underground Limited, a public sector company. It will be in charge of all operational matters, from changing signals to driving trains and to staffing stations. The public-private partnerships will be very different from wholesale privatisation. Strategic control will be maintained by the public sector, which will report to the mayor.
	In my view, the proposals that I have outlined are a sensible way to lever in private sector investment and project management expertise while preserving the necessary safeguards that the travelling public expect. I am sure that, if all these points were properly understood, we would see much greater backing for what the Government are seeking to achieve. I shall certainly do my best to give them my support and to win the argument that I know my noble and learned friend also seeks to win.

Lord Bradshaw: My Lords, we must thank the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, for introducing the subject, to which I imagine that we shall return again and again. I do not have the confidence expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner of Worcester, in the new arrangements to which he has just referred. We need single-minded management of the London Underground. The noble Lord, Lord Fowler, referred to "strong management". I do not believe that we shall secure that if the system is divided in the manner just described to the House.
	The management has to be intent on running all the trains listed in the timetable. At certain peak hours, an estimate of 5 per cent of trains not running to time or cancelled is a sad underestimate. That means paying close attention to detail on matters such as the recruitment and retention of staff, as well as attention to failures of equipment such as rolling stock, signalling and escalators. It also means paying attention to rates of staff sickness and absenteeism, and on insisting that the trade unions behave like 21st century organisations by giving up their Victorian attitudes when making outrageous demands of London commuters.
	No management will be able to concentrate on such matters if it is distracted by discussions about where investment money should come from. At the moment, the management team at London Underground is extremely distracted. It is currently extolling the virtues of the PPP. Of course management needs a sure source of money, but it ought not to care from where it comes. It cannot do everything.
	At the same time, the Mayor for London cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds by pretending to be on the side of the travelling public while, at the same time, he is on the side of the trade unions. However, that is what he is trying to do. His responsibilities lie overwhelmingly with the public, especially as he has stated his intention of introducing congestion charges in the not too distant future.
	I conclude in the first place that management should be clear that its job is to provide a first-class service; it is not management's job to indulge in the niceties or otherwise of the PPP, of whether the Treasury will provide the money or, indeed, our preferred solution, which is that the money should be raised from bonds. I also believe emphatically that the wheel and the rail belong together in a partnership. I believe that that partnership will be split apart by the PPP, which will be fatal to the operation of a proper Underground service. No doubt all noble Lords realise that that would be the case, given the sorry saga of Railtrack.
	Over all the time that the problem of the PPP stretches, not only do we distract the management of London Transport, but we allow the mayor and his team—which includes Mr Kiley—off the hook of taking full responsibility not only for the Underground itself, but also of taking responsibility for the introduction of congestion charges. I should remind noble Lords that the congestion charging scheme, which was set out in the manifesto and included in Mr Prescott's famous Green Paper, must be introduced. It is not an option; we must introduce congestion charges. In her contribution, the noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, drew attention to the problems being encountered in the West End. My noble friend Lady Hamwee mentioned in her remarks that, in his Green Paper, the Deputy Prime Minister had given a commitment to these developments.
	I have checked this morning and the financing favoured by these Benches, which includes using the bond system, is still available. Furthermore, it is still available despite the events which took place in America on 11th September, in spite of what has happened at Railtrack, and in spite of what was said yesterday in another place about that company. We are very much in favour of raising the necessary funds for the Underground in this way. As we know, the bonds will be serviced by that most secure method of funding, passenger fares.
	I do not believe that the public want all the property and station developments which feature in the PPP; they want a good, reliable service. That is more about trains than about stations, although I imagine that the stations are writ large in the plans of the developers.
	We believe that the mayor should have the money, because until he gets it he is not accountable to anyone; he can sit on the sidelines and watch what is going on. I agree with my noble friend Lord Ezra about accountability. The mayor should be accountable to visitors and tourists to London, as well as to the businessmen and the people who live here and use the Underground in large numbers every day. We hope that the mayor will go on to account to the electorate for his stewardship of the Underground. However, as matters stand at present, he can blame everyone else for what is going on. He no doubt will. He is a very astute politician, if nothing else.
	We on these Benches believe that the mayor has made promises he cannot deliver. He has talked about a 24-hour Underground system, but we know that parts of the Underground need to be closed for quite some time in order for it to be properly maintained. You cannot have this and rebuild the Underground at the same time.
	We are all in two or more minds about where CrossRail will go. Each week we seem to have different terminals for something which we are still a long way from building. Thameslink 2000—it was called Thameslink 2000 because it was supposed to open in 2000—is still tunnelling its merry way through the planning system.
	This is a Government who promise a great deal in transport but do absolutely nothing. Nothing is being done. We hear all the time about what will happen; we do not hear what is happening.
	The mayor promises more frequent services in the inner suburbs. That is at odds with the requirements of the longer distance travellers and the commuters who live just outside London, where there is not room to meet what he wants and what they want. Again, a lot of work has to be done if we are to get the suburban railway services he wants in those parts of London which are not served by the Underground and are otherwise very poorly served.
	I sympathise with the noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, about bus lanes because they are a substitute for the Underground. The noble Baroness may not be happy with enforcement in London, but it is non-existent outside London because the rules, I believe, apply only to London, not to anywhere else. There are bus lanes outside London, but the amount of enforcement is ludicrously small.
	This Government stand accused of not prosecuting the difficult transport decisions. This is but one of them. I hope that in his reply to the debate, the noble and learned Lord will tell us what the Government intend to do to make life a little better for people in London and elsewhere.

Viscount Astor: My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Peyton of Yeovil for introducing the debate. He, of course, is a former transport Minister and he has kept up both his interest and expertise in the subject in this House.
	This is one mess that the Government have got themselves into for which not even the noble and learned Lord can blame the previous Conservative government. It is entirely a self-created mess. The Government's plans fail their own first test, which was set by the Labour Party in its 1997 manifesto. They promised that,
	"Labour will improve the Underground and guarantee value for money for taxpayers and passengers".
	The Government's proposals have been described by the Economist as, "half baked and either nai ve or dishonest". The Select Committee in another place called their plans "a convoluted compromise".
	The Government's plans arose out of trying to square the circle of public ownership and private money. They came about after rows within the Labour Party about the part privatisation of the air traffic control system. The Government have come up with a cobbled together compromise called PPP—public private partnership. In the process they have fallen out with their mayor, Ken Livingstone, and have tried to discredit Bob Kiley, the head of Transport for London. After John Prescott prevented Mr Kiley from seeing vital documents concerning the proposed PPP, the Government launched an attack on him. They forced Bob Evans, a senior civil servant, out of a job because he refused to spin against Bob Kiley, and we have heard from my noble friend Lord Peyton of Yeovil about the letter that was sent.
	The Government also promised that if independent evidence were produced to show that PPP does not offer value for money, it would not go ahead. Yet, when faced with the Deloitte & Touche report which showed a lack of value for money, they sought to bury the report and resorted to the courts. Luckily, the High Court ruled that the Government should not have suppressed the report.
	Perhaps I may remind your Lordships of the executive summary of the Deloitte report. It stated:
	"We have seen no evidence that there is a valid basis for establishing that PPP will achieve value for money using commonly accepted techniques for projects of this nature. The selection of a 30 year contract for this purpose is flawed because bidders were not required to submit firm prices for the whole period".
	No one can deny that London Underground needs investment. Like the rail industry, it has suffered from a historical lack of funding. However, we must be mindful that the Tube is running often at near full capacity and we cannot expect large increases in passengers without major long-term capital projects. My noble friend Lady Gardner of Parkes asked the Minister about CrossRail. Can the noble and learned Lord tell the House what is the position with CrossRail? Will it go ahead? If so, when, and how will it be funded?
	As the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said, the Government's record is one of broken promises. They promised recently £775 million of investment, but, when the Secretary of State announced the figures, suddenly there was 30 per cent less. That means cuts now in spending on safety improvements; cuts in spending on maintenance of lifts and escalators; and cuts in spending on other infrastructure.
	I do not totally blame the Minister because we know that the PPP policy has been forced onto his department by the Treasury. The Chancellor will do almost anything to get spending off his books, even if it means a greater cost in the end to the taxpayer and to the passenger.
	Through PPP, the Chancellor is transferring a huge risk to those funding the improvement of capital assets, but they will not own those assets. The private sector does not trust the Government after the Railtrack fiasco, but it will now be asked to become financially responsible for risks on assets that it does not own. The City banks working on loans for PPP are clearly saying that forcing Railtrack into administration has dented the City's confidence in supporting large infrastructure projects. The effect will be that lenders will charge more for the £4.5 billion of loans required. We know that those considering investing will demand a 35 per cent or higher return. Do the Government consider that good value for the taxpayer? When did the Minister's department last communicate with the financial institutions involved in financing the PPP deal for the Tube? What reservations have these financial institutions expressed about their continued involvement in PPP since 7th October?
	Perhaps the Minister may care to answer the question put by his noble friend Lord Barnett to the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, on Monday, when he asked whether the Government would,
	"publish a paper indicating how calculations are made as to value for money in the case of a PPP as compared with financing the projects through the Treasury".—[Official Report, 12/11/01; col. 365.]
	We certainly did not receive a satisfactory answer on Monday. It has been suggested that the Government should allow London Underground to raise money through bonds, as the New York City Transit Authority did. That is not privatisation, but it might be a cheaper way to raise money.
	Bringing private investment into a nationalised industry is not just about funding; it is also about changing the culture by introducing concepts of service and value for money for customers, brought about by investment, expertise and efficiency. The worry is that PPP will not deliver any of those. It separates management and the renewal of the infrastructure from the running of the trains and the interface with the passengers. The operation of the trains and passenger services is where private operators can make a difference, but under the Government's proposals there will not be any real incentives for maintaining and improving the frequency of trains or for upgrading the rolling stock.
	We do not even know when PPP will come about, let alone when it will deliver improvements. We understand that a contract is supposed to be signed by the end of the year, but that now looks optimistic. The Government's plans are already running two years late. When do Ministers expect to sign the first contracts?
	I understand that there are two main contracts for 30 years, covering refurbishments and maintenance. As we have heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, they are so complex that they run to 2 million words.
	We hear that the Government plan to split the Tube into four sections, with three franchises responsible for the lines. The running of the trains and the maintenance of the signalling will remain the responsibility of the public sector. It is a bizarre scheme. Even the Minister seemed to agree, during a recent debate on Railtrack, that the train operating companies are an improvement. How does he explain such a different approach for London Underground?
	As I understand it, the aim of PPP is to refurbish all the stations by 2008 and the trains over 18 years. After the end of the contracts, in 20 or 30 years, the ownership will revert to London Underground. Will the contracts include new lines and route extensions? My understanding is that they will not. Perhaps the Minister can explain how new lines are to be funded.
	We know that the Health and Safety Executive will have a role. Can the Minister confirm that the HSE has yet to approve the complex and detailed safety plans? When does he expect the report on safety? There is concern that the Government's proposals put safety at risk.
	The Minister and his department have achieved one magnificent feat—they have put forward a proposal that everyone seems to hate. Mayor Ken Livingstone hates it, but he will end up being responsible for it. The unions do not support it and nor to industry experts, for cost and safety reasons. I challenge the noble and learned Lord to name someone, apart from the Chancellor, who supports PPP funding for the tube.
	While this mess continues, passengers suffer, trains are late and commuters are desperate to find other ways to work. I feel sorry for the staff of London Underground. They do their best and it is not their fault that the system is such a mess.
	My noble friend Lord Fowler reminded your Lordships that the Evening Standard called Tuesday 23rd October "Black Tuesday", because there were 15 hours of delays on 10 tube lines—the worst on record. It may be true that many Londoners do not care whether London Underground is in the private or public sector, but they want action from the Government. They want improvements and accountability and they want them now. The Government have wasted five years. Their objective should have been to improve the reliability of services as well as building new lines to increase capacity. Under the Government's plans, that will take longer, fares will go up and, as with Railtrack, the poor old passengers will continue to suffer.

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe: My Lords, we have heard the approach that the Liberal Democrats favour, but we still wait with interest to hear what the Conservatives would do.

Viscount Astor: My Lords, this is a debate on the Government's proposals for London Underground, not the Opposition's. When, as I hope, I sit where the noble and learned Lord is sitting, of course the noble Lord will be entirely within his rights to question me on my proposals, but this debate is about the Government's proposals.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I join in the congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, for three reasons: first, on winning the ballot so that we could have this important debate; secondly, on his contribution, because, although I disagree with a great deal of what he said, he delivered a speech that electrified the House and defined the issues; and, thirdly, on providing a template for transport Ministers, because, if what my noble friend Lord Faulkner of Worcester said is right, the noble Lord presided over a golden age in which he always won the significant battles against the Treasury. One solution to providing certainty of long-term investment might be to find a clone of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, so that the public could always be sure that such battles would be won. Unfortunately, no such process is yet known to man, so we have had to seek other solutions for the Tube.

Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, it was kind of the noble and learned Lord to say that, but I have not so far been swept off my feet with gratitude to the Treasury as to admire them or wish them a long life.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: I had noticed, my Lords.
	Every speaker in the debate—with the exception of the noble Viscount, Lord Astor—came back to the essential point made by the noble Lord, Lord Peyton. The noble Viscount did not grapple with the issues and, although the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, asked the noble Viscount what his solution would be, he gave no indication of his ideas for the way forward, unlike everybody else who has spoken.

Viscount Astor: My Lords, does the noble and learned Lord accept that it is the job of the Opposition to oppose?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I had hoped that the noble Viscount would make a constructive contribution to the debate and give us his ideas on the way forward, as everybody else did.
	The noble Lord, Lord Peyton, said, in his excellent speech, that the Government's advisers had led us down the garden path and we should never have gone for the PPP. Instead, he said that we should have left it to Mr Kiley to run the Tube, because he is an experienced man who could provide the solution. Stripped of all the personalities and politics, that is the noble Lord's argument. He said that the Treasury could have provided the money and that would have been the way forward.
	Everybody else in the debate has rightly identified two essential problems for the Tube. First, how do we ensure long-term commitment to finance? Secondly, how do we make sure that that finance is properly managed in ensuring the quality of the infrastructure? The noble Lord, Lord Peyton, suggested that we should go on as before. What is the evidence on that? The Jubilee Line extension was a considerable period late and had cost overruns of between £1.4 billion and £1.5 billion. Is that a sensible way forward? I suggest that it is not.
	Raising finance on the bond market is another suggestion to find a way forward. It is absolutely right to say that that is probably cheaper than many other methods of raising money, but a cheaper method still is to rely on money from the Treasury. London Underground's record on previous projects shows what happens when we do that.
	The cheapness of the money is not the issue, although it is one element. Borrowing on the bond market has no effect on the management. Something more than just cheap borrowing is needed.
	What about the romantic solution that I think the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, suggested? He seemed to advocate privatising London Underground and breaking it into five separate bits that were operated separately. I am not sure if that is his policy or that of noble Viscount, Lord Astor, who rather grumpily tells me that it is not for him to tell me what his policy is. Does anyone believe that dividing the system into five is the way forward? We have experienced the effect of Railtrack. The noble Viscount, Lord Astor, was, I believe, shrewd and sensible not to let on because, if that was his policy, it would not find much support.
	Therefore, the suggestions put forward by the noble Lords, Lord Peyton, Lord Fowler and Lord Bradshaw, and by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, do not meet the problem. The problem is a very difficult one and we have wrestled with it. The solution that we have come up with is to keep London Underground together in operational terms. The line, the trains, the stations and the service to the customer will all remain with London Underground. However, it will enter into long-term contracts for the maintenance of the track and the improvement of the infrastructure with the infra-co companies.
	Who are the infra-co companies? They are, first, expert contractors who know how to deal with the work. Secondly, in many cases, they have been carrying out work for London Underground for a considerable period of time, but they have been doing so on a short-term rather than a long-term basis. By entering into these contracts, they will have commitment to London Underground in the long term and a real interest in ensuring that they deliver high quality services.
	It is difficult to reach a conclusion about what to do. It is difficult to ensure that one delivers a quality service to the people who use London Underground, but it is a vital obligation of any central government to ensure that that happens. However, we have worked through the detail and have reached this conclusion. The noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, reminded us that the first consultant was Satan. He then referred to other consultants who advise his side of the argument. He said that they are right and that our consultants are wrong.
	The analysis that we have carried out produces a result that refigures the management and brings about a step change in relation to the maintenance and organisation of the track and the stations. However, it also keeps the whole organisation together and keeps it in public hands. We consider that to be a sensible solution. The noble Viscount, Lord Astor, asked me to name someone apart from the Government who supports that solution. I take one name at random: Digby Jones of the CBI believes that it is a very sensible way forward. So do we, and, subject to the infra-co contracts being value for money—that will be attested by independent advisers to both London Underground and the Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions—and with the NAO watching the whole process, we believe that we shall be able to proceed in a way that will deliver better services for Londoners.

Earl Russell: My Lords, in considering these contracts, does the noble and learned Lord agree that he has developed a system where the buck never stops? He has therefore discovered the secret of perpetual motion and is much to be congratulated.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, certainly not. Under the arrangements that have been made, London Underground will be responsible for running London Underground. It will enter into long-term contracts. It will be responsible for delivering the service and will be accountable to TfL. Once the PPPs are completed, arrangements will be made to transfer the service to TfL, who, in turn, will be accountable to the mayor. I do not believe that entering into a long-term contract means that one passes the buck round in a circle; rather, one identifies precisely where responsibility should lie and places that responsibility with people who are expert at dealing with it.
	Having dealt with the central argument at the heart of the debate, perhaps I may go on to deal with particular points raised by noble Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Elder, made the point—in my submission, correctly—that it has fallen to this Government to deal with the problem after years and years of under-investment.
	The noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said that we should not talk about the past. It is worth pointing out that under the previous government investment went down and down. If the plans of the Conservatives had been followed, investment would have decreased from £160 million to nil. However, I agree that we should not talk about the past; we should talk about the future. We need to have a system in place for the future which will ensure that we do not experience the cost overruns of the scale that we saw in relation to the Jubilee Line extension.

Lord Bradshaw: My Lords, I have heard about cost overruns on the Jubilee Line ad nauseam. That project did overrun. First, it was subject to the collapse of the Austrian tunnel method at Heathrow Airport, and work stopped for a considerable time. Secondly, the line had to run in time for the opening of the Dome. That placed the unions in an extremely strong position and they extorted vast sums of money to finish it. However, let us consider the East Coast Main Line and the Channel Tunnel terminal at Waterloo. Those were public sector contracts which were delivered before time and on budget. Because a project is placed with the public sector, that does not necessarily mean that it will be overspent or done badly. The case of the Jubilee Line is a bad one but it is a special case.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I suspect that we could debate the detail of the Jubilee Line extension at considerable length. At the end of the process, the American contractors, Bectel, were brought in to ensure delivery on time, and they did. That appears to indicate that expert management can often produce significant results in relation to a contract such as that.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, congratulated the Government on making the structure of public service issues such an important matter. She described in graphic and impressive terms what is wrong with London Underground. We do not dispute the figures that she gave indicating the urgent need for an improvement in the service. She also said that the way forward must be settled so that progress can be made. We agree emphatically with that. A decision has been made to proceed with the PPPs, and the right course is for all the parties involved to make those PPPs work. She said that transparency is important. I could not agree more.
	The noble Baroness also had concerns about the structure. She asked what is the Government's alternative—their "Plan B". The answer is that we believe that we can make the PPP work, and we are currently engaged in that. She also said that the issue is too much about personalities. I believe that she is right. We should all be trying to make the solution work.
	In his very clear and excellent speech, the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said that transport should be separated from the Department of the Environment. He will be glad to hear that that is what happened immediately after the last election. He said that it is an important area of policy, and I agree with that.
	The noble Lord also said that one must recognise the importance of London Underground. As I said earlier, we regard it as a vital national asset that must be made to work because of the importance of the success of London and the importance of the Underground to the people who use it. He said that ensuring that the Tube service was fit for the 21st century was an urgent task. I agree entirely with that proposition. He stated that there was a need for new investment. Again, everyone would agree with that. The PPP will bring in that investment over 30 years.
	The noble Lord also referred to the privatisation option. Again, I have indicated that that was never on the cards. I repeat that the suggestion of breaking the company into five separate parts—I am not clear where the noble Lord stands on that—does not sound a very sensible idea. He referred to the bond option. We say that that would not bring about a sufficient change in the management structure. One must focus on improving the management as well as focusing on the issue of where the cheapest money is to be found in the money market.
	The noble Lord said that the proposals amount to no more than contracting out. In one sense, he is right. It is contracting one aspect of what must be done in relation to the Tube service, first, to the people who know how to do so and, secondly, those people must have a long-term commitment to the delivery of the result.
	He said that the system should be more unified. Perhaps I may deal with that point. We have kept the system together. As my noble friend Lord Faulkner of Worcester made clear, this is quite different from the Railtrack privatisation, which the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, in a moment of admirable candour, indicated that he utterly opposed at all stages. Well done to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler. The same sentiment was put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Peyton. He made clear throughout the process of that legislation through both Houses of Parliament that he opposed the proposals for the nationalisation of Railtrack in 1992 and 1993. It is a unified system, because London Underground retains the whole operation of the system. It is not like Railtrack, where one person runs the track and a plethora of operating companies run various trains.
	The third point made by the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, was that operation in one set of hands is important. We agree; that is what we have achieved. We have contracted with the contractors to provide the services needed. He then talked about an opportunity lost. He mentioned a privatisation scheme but did not specify what it was, and therefore gave us no clue what opportunity it was that we lost. As I said, we have thought long and hard; we have taken advice—though I hardly dare mention it—from consultants; this is the solution that meets the problems.
	The noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, gave us the benefit of his experience on the board of National Air Traffic Services and said, as I think that we would all agree, that one size does not fit all. Solutions need to be tailored to the circumstances. He said that the effect of the creation of NATS was to lever in private capital, which meant that investment would flow for the coming years, which is vital.
	The noble Lord, Lord Ezra, stressed the importance of certainty of investment, and emphasised that there must be constructive relationships. The noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, was slightly dismissive of that point. She said that she did not disagree with the proposition that constructive relationships are important, but they are extremely important when there are several people who must agree on the way forward. The travelling public want agreement so that the way forward can be settled and taken.
	As I said, the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, mentioned under-investment and uncertainty of investment—about which everybody would agree. That is what the PPP is intended to address. The PPP will ensure adequate flow of investment over a period. The noble Lord referred to Treasury money and bond money; I have dealt with both. Obviously, Treasury money would be the cheapest. But where is the certainty over a long period? How would we achieve the necessary change in management?
	I have dealt with the question: is divided responsibility sensible? There will not be divided responsibility; there will be unified responsibility. On accountability, infra-cos have a long-term contract with London Underground. After the PPPs are in place, London Underground will report to Transport for London; TfL is responsible to the Mayor of London. How does that relate to the mayor's obligation to produce a safe and efficient transport system for London? He will have political responsibility for TfL; the scheme will be up and running; it will be his responsibility to ensure that it works.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, gave an important description of the need for London Underground. She referred in particular to the problem of night life in London; she referred to London as a world city and a 24-hour city with clubs discharging 60,000 people between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. That is why we need a functioning transport system that runs for 24 hours. We entirely agree with that.
	The noble Baroness referred to the evidence of Mr Wilfred Newton, who had been responsible for the mass transit system in Hong Kong, and who pointed out that in the time it took for the British system to go through all the legal proceedings to determine whether permission would be given, they built the whole mass transit system in Hong Kong. I do not know what were the precise times, but there is a widespread feeling that major infrastructure projects in this country take much too long from conception to commission. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions made clear in July in another place that he will consult on new procedures to speed up that process. The noble Baroness made an important point.
	In an impressive speech, my noble friend Lord Faulkner of Worcester made the argument for the PPP much more eloquently than it has often been made. He gave an impressive and measured account of the arguments in favour of it. It is worth saying that the arguments in favour have not been matched by any detailed argument for an alternative scheme. Like every speaker in the debate, he focused on the two real problems with the Tube: severe under-investment requiring certainty of investment in the long term and a change in management structure to deliver the major repairs, maintenance and infrastructure improvement that are required.
	The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said that he did not have the confidence that my noble friend had in the PPP and asked how it will get the management that it needs. I agree with him that there are lots of first-class people in London Underground wanting to deliver a good operational service. In terms of maintenance and building the infrastructure, the management will come from the experts in the infra-cos, who have been delivering that service over a long period.
	The noble Lord referred to the need for a sure source of money; that is provided by the PPP. He emphasised the need for a first-class service; we agree. He said that it is important that wheel and rail be brought together; I emphasise that they are. London Underground is responsible for them both. He said that the mayor should have money; the right way forward is the way that we set up through the PPP. He said that we promise a great deal and do nothing; we have spent a long time providing a structure that will ensure long-term investment for the Tube and proper management to deliver the infrastructure changes it requires.
	We have been consistent in our policy and are driving it through. The best thing for those who use London Underground is that people accept that our policy is the way forward and all work together to try to make it work.

Viscount Astor: My Lords, before the noble and learned Lord sits down, will he answer my question about CrossRail? Will that and other capital projects by funded from the PPP, or will they receive a different form of funding?

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: We are not immediately able to make detailed decisions about CrossRail.

Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, I should not dare to take up much of your Lordships' time after the debate that we have had. I should like first to thank those noble Lords who have taken part, and in particular, the Minister. He has charm; he has eloquence; he has wonderful skill in footwork. He can change the subject without our noticing, and it takes an awful effort on the part of very much older people such as myself always to follow him.
	I did understand, and was deeply grateful for, the start of his speech, which was extremely flattering to me. I must make it clear to the Minister, if he does not know it already, that I have an almost unlimited appetite for such words. However, I should add that, much as I longed to believe that I had won some notable victory over the Treasury during my time as Minister of Transport, I am terribly sorry, but I could not remember one. The Minister of Transport who actually won any kind of victory over the Treasury is a figure that belongs deep in the roots of mythology.
	I have only two more things to say. The first is by way of slight apology for suggesting, as I did, that both the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is the Minister at the heart of the matter, and the Secretary of State, who is really nothing much more than a chorus girl, had treated a rather eminent man such as Mr Kiley with shameful discourtesy. I omitted to say that the Prime Minister, by contrast, received and listened to Mr Kiley—something that was much appreciated.
	The noble and learned Lord said that the whole of my plea was that we should give Mr Kiley a chance. That is true; it is a perfectly fair comment on my speech. But my reason for advocating that we listen to Mr Kiley and give him a chance is that he, unlike any of the other dramatis personae, has a record of quite outstanding success which has stood up to attempts to smear it. He brought with him at least a ray of hope, whereas the Treasury, which looks as though it will win this battle as it has won almost every other, is successful only in generating despair among the managers it refuses to support.
	I have no desire to receive any Papers on this so I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

Post-16 Education

Lord Pilkington of Oxenford: rose to call attention to the arrangements for post-16 education; and to move for Papers.
	My Lords, I put forward this Motion because I feel that many crucial decisions are made between the ages of 16 and the early 20s, decisions which often decide the pattern of our lives. It is therefore of immense importance that our education system is able to satisfy the needs and aspirations of our citizens during that important period.
	We all agree that we wish to give young people the knowledge and skill to equip them to lead fulfilled and useful lives. I proposed this Motion because I am seriously worried that over the past few years decisions have been made which have meant that our crucial educational patterns are less effective in achieving those ideals than those of our near neighbours.
	I begin with the A-level examination. For over 50 years the A-level examination has played an important role in our educational system. Many have felt for a long time, even when I was a young man leaving school, that it was too narrow a system and ought to be made broader. The model that was held before us over 20 or 30 years was the model of the baccalaureate. I must point out, as a matter of fact, that the French baccalaureate consists of a number of pre-arranged groupings of subjects. One takes a set menu and a set pattern rather than an à la carte menu from which one can take any selection of subjects. One examination is taken at the end of the course, and that is that.
	Instead of embarking in our broadening process on the model that has been held out for decades, we chose to create the AS model; that is, four or so subjects are taken at a lower level in the first year of sixth form, and then two, three or more A-levels are taken at the end of the second year. That means constant examination. It is unique in Europe. Three examinations are taken in three years—GCSE, AS and then the A-level.
	Enormous pressure is put on resources. Time which used to be given to valuable though un-examined extra studies, which was a great feature of the English sixth form during most of my teaching career, is eliminated. But above all, no set pattern of subjects is imposed, as it is in France. So there is no guarantee that the AS system will result in broadening. A modern linguist could take three languages at A-level and another two or so at AS level. The French system rests on imposed patterns.
	Further—this is important and I shall be interested in the Minister's comments on this—we must remember that one of the advantages of the old A-level (the narrow specialisation) and one of the reasons it was kept going for so long was that where three subjects were studied in depth, it meant that the schools could service the university course. In effect, the traditional A-level meant that the first year of university work was done at school. The broader courses of continental Europe demand, and always have, university courses of four years or more. That is the norm throughout Europe. The reason we were able to avoid that was because, in effect, the first year's work was done in the sixth form. A survey was carried out in France by the University of Strasbourg which showed that the standard reached in traditional A-level chemistry here in the early 1980s was equivalent to that reached in the first year of a French university course. Therefore, one has to ask whether the Government are prepared to finance longer university courses which may result from the ideal of a broader sixth-form curriculum.
	The AS pattern—I am stating the obvious—has not been a success. In essence, it is the wrong solution to a broader sixth-form curriculum; there are too many examinations and insufficient thought has been given to resources or the university three-year honours course.
	Another area of worry is vocational education. In England we worried and agonised over vocational education at the end of the 19th century. The Victorians were more effective in vocational education than we have ever been since. The whisky tax of the early 1890s financed technical colleges. We have desperately tried in many ways over the past 130 years to improve our vocational education. Yet, again, the decisions we have made in this regard have not necessarily done so.
	Throughout almost all of western Europe—particularly in Germany, which has in many ways been a model for vocational education and has been imitated by Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Austria and Switzerland—the pattern has been to have separate institutions for vocational and academic studies, in Germany from the age of 13, and in France and most of what can be described as Latin Europe from the age of 16. There are also distinct examinations taken at the end of the course; for example, in France the Baccalauréat professionel is a separate vocational examination with standards set to provide professional prestige for vocational education.
	That seems to have increased the prestige and acceptability of vocational qualifications in a way that does not happen in England. Those who have travelled in Denmark or Germany may have noticed that German and Danish plumbers put their qualifications on the side of their van. I have never seen any English plumber write "GNVQ" on the side of his van. It is difficult—I speak as a former schoolmaster—to devise a common system of standards for an examination that is broad enough to cover Latin, Greek and higher mathematics and specific vocational standards as well.
	But we have not modelled our pattern on those of our successful continental neighbours. Our policy is, in effect, to run single examination vocational and academic courses. Further to that, and an inevitable result of it, is that we do not have specialist vocational colleges such as exist in western Europe and the United States of America—the former as a result of state policy and the other as a result of market forces. In any state in the United States one finds specialist vocational colleges paralleling academic universities.
	Again we must ask ourselves—these are fundamental points of structure—whether we have got the answer right. More worrying is that we have boasted over the past few years about the improvement in results gained at GCSE and A-level. In 1980, 8.8 per cent of the papers examined gained an A grade at A-level. In 2000, the figure was 17.6 per cent, which is 8.8 per cent doubled, whereas the number of papers taken increased by only a quarter during that period. Again, as a former schoolmaster, no one would be more delighted than me if such a dramatic change had occurred. I would certainly have expected a large bonus. However, recent evidence has been produced revealing that the standard has been lowered.
	Jeffrey Robinson, a former chief examiner of the Cambridge board, claimed that in 1989 those taking intermediate level mathematics had to secure 65 per cent to obtain a grade C; in 2000 they had to score 45 per cent. That is a considerable drop. Recently, at a wedding I sat next to a senior history examiner from the same board. He told me that the standard demanded for a grade A in A-level history had fallen from 75 per cent to 65 per cent. That explains why, in the classes I taught in my latter years, when I thought I was successful, I gained more grade As than I had gained in the whole of my career previously.
	That is alarming. It means that universities—I refer to the academic side—may select for demanding courses students who do not have the talent to undertake them. They are fooling themselves. That is not good; neither for the university nor for the students. A-levels are a crucial element in enabling higher education institutions to be given the right evidence on what course will suit each student.
	However, there is an even more alarming development. We must remember that our degree qualifications are like our currency: they can be judged by people abroad. If we reduce the standard of entry and consequently reduce the standard of degree—whether for reasons of positive discrimination or whatever—we shall end up with a situation in which our university degrees are not recognised abroad. There have been problems with our physics degrees in Switzerland, and other problems are beginning to occur. In other words, this is not something we can fix on our own.
	Above all, looming over the whole debate on post-16 education is the problem of funding. If we are to broaden educational courses, we need money for teachers, and so much more. It is deplorable that in Britain a university professor earns £46,000 per year. That is a low salary compared to the international league. It is not surprising that some of the television stars who appear in great history programmes are professors not in this country but in America. All these matters relate to funding.
	In a letter to the chairman of the Learning and Skills Council relating to post-16 funding, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers stated:
	"Dear Mr Harwood, . . .
	1. No reference has been made to the schools' full entitlement to additional grants, eg Threshold, Upper Spine and Leadership pay money, SSG, Standards Fund and Formula Capital.
	2. The Real Terms Guarantee may well be flawed: the financial impact of Curriculum 2000 has not been allowed for. The £2,600 figure penalises higher spending LEAS. The compensation offered for 2001/02 injection of extra LEA funding is vague in the extreme. The one-off adjustment is inadequate.
	3. Why is any better provision via the Formula only available if it is affordable, and what does this mean?
	4. Why are LSCs saying that they cannot handle these issues?".
	When the secretary of a major teachers' union writes that sort of letter and then circulates all his members to ask whether the Government are providing extra funds, one wonders whether "education, education, education" is really the answer to the problem.
	We all support the Government's ideal, so often expressed, that our young people should obtain qualifications and skills that equip them for the new and complex world of the 21st century. However, I feel that the Government often ignore the realities of the situation and pretend that all is going well when it is not. I have given examples of grade inflation. When doubts are raised by professional people who have examined for 20 or 30 years, it is not enough to say, "You are belittling the achievements of children"; one is not. However, as any teacher knows, we have to be realistic and we should not tell people that they have done well when they have not.
	I hope that the Minister will be able to address the problems. Perhaps I may remind her of the AS experiment; the continuing difficulties of vocational education; the problem of running a common system, and grade inflation but, above all, of the need for proper funding, about which situation teachers currently have grave doubts. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.

The Lord Bishop of Blackburn: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, for introducing the debate. I cannot speak with the personal experience which he brings to this important subject. It is a long time now, more years than I care to remember, since I had responsibility for the lower sixth at the Tiffin School, although I am a member of the Corporation Board of Blackburn College, a distinction I share with the Foreign Secretary.
	However, I share with the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, a commitment to the highest quality of education at all levels. I believe that that truly is the commitment of Her Majesty's Government also. Indeed, the Secretary of State for Education and Skills spoke to the General Synod of the Church of England earlier today and shared something of her and the Government's vision and strategy. In my role as chairman of the Church of England Board of Education, I can say how welcome and well received were her visit and speech. Indeed, the Synod gave her the rare accolade of a standing ovation for the affirmation and challenge she gave to the Church's educational work within the maintained sector.
	I wish to comment briefly on three aspects of post-16 education: the breadth of the curriculum, vocational education and local learning partnerships. I turn first to the breadth of the curriculum. As the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, indicated, AS levels have had a difficult birth, though I am not so negative about their conception. They were perhaps introduced too quickly and without adequate preparation. Clearly, there have been problems concerned with resources and, as the noble Lord said, examination timetabling and marking. Universities and employers seem not to know how to rate them. It takes time for new initiatives to be appreciated. I believe that the jury is still out; at least in the reported comments I read in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph and other local newspapers, that seems to be the case which headteachers are making at presentation of awards evenings in my part of the world. I hope that the Government will not be as discouraged as the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, would wish them to be, even though one has to admit that AS levels have been criticised by my old friend, Dr Nick Tate, who was one of the architects of the new examinations. AS levels should not be dropped but made to work. Excessive specialisation at 16 is not necessary, with so many young people going on to further and higher education. Those pursuing plans for arts or language courses have much to learn from other disciplines. We should continue to see how best that can be ensured.
	Before I leave the question of breadth in the curriculum, I must add a word about the place of religious education in the post-16 curriculum. There has been a welcome reassertion in recent years that RE is compulsory at all stages of schooling. I would want to be reassured that that requirement is being faithfully and imaginatively followed in all schools and sixth-form colleges, for anecdotal evidence suggests that that is not always the case. Surely it is most valuable for young people to be able to stand back from intense study and reflect more widely on questions of meaning and purpose. Moreover, spiritual development contributes to effective learning for young people over 16, as for their younger brothers and sisters. There really is more to life than work.
	That leads me to the Government's aims on vocational education. I welcome the intention to give vocational pathways equal status to academic pathways. But I look forward to seeing what that will mean in practice and hope that it is more than what was announced in September; an American-style graduation ceremony. I look for reassurance that freedom to vary the school curriculum to allow a more developed vocational emphasis will not be allowed to have the effect of further narrowing the curriculum and making it no more than a preparation for one kind of work. I wonder how, within the greater freedom, the compulsory place of religious education will be protected and, more widely, spiritual development assured.
	Finally, I turn to local learning partnerships. I recall that during the passage of the Learning and Skills Act these Benches positively welcomed the Government's creation of the learning and skills councils at both national and local level. In particular, we welcomed the bringing together of further education and work-based education, and the extension of government support via local LSCs to voluntary bodies. Of course the term "voluntary bodies" includes the Churches, often very actively committed to learning opportunities of all kinds and at all levels, not least for those previously excluded from learning or who had excluded themselves from learning opportunities during compulsory schooling.
	The Church of England, alongside other Churches, has a significant commitment to statutory education and to voluntary education. So the partnership with local government is very important to the Church and we work hard to achieve it. In some places, the Churches have been brought into successful partnership with the local learning and skills councils, but I am sorry to say that that is far from the case across the nation.
	I want to ask that central government and the national Learning and Skills Council ensure that those partnerships flourish and develop effectively at local level. In the meantime, where that partnership has not been developed effectively, we have doubts about the Government's intention to give the local learning and skills councils a more significant role in making proposals for the provision of post-16 education. I look forward to the Minister's reassurance on the Government's commitment to the partnership between the LSCs and the voluntary bodies, including the Churches.

Baroness Brigstocke: My Lords, first, I must apologise to the House and especially to the Minister because a long-standing commitment means that I shall have to leave the debate early. Today I speak as the chairman of Landau Forte College, which is a city technology college and a comprehensive school in Derby. I have been its chairman for nine years.
	Children, and that includes those who are 16-plus, are candles to be lit, not bottles to be filled. The future of post-16 education in this country worries me. I hope that I am wrong, but the signs do not seem good. I shall mention only two of my worries. The first concerns AS-levels and the way in which they have been introduced without sufficient consultation.
	AS-levels were pitchforked into the curriculum for school students in the first year of their A-levels—a year which in the past gave a brief breathing space. It was one year without the pressure of exams. Noble Lords will remember that up to GCSE-level school children are tested, first, at the age of seven, then at 11, then at 14 and then at 16. The following year, the first year of the A-level course and the vocational Advanced Vocational Certificate of Education (previously GNVQ) was always a great relief. In the past it gave students the chance to develop a new interest—for instance, working for the Duke of Edinburgh Award—or to concentrate on an old one—perhaps a musical instrument, a team game, acting or organising the lighting for a play. It even provided a little time to ponder and reflect. The great Sydney Smith—writing, I must emphasise, in Sketches in Moral Philosophy—stated:
	"There is one piece of advice, in a life of study, which I think no one will object to: that is, every now and then, to be completely idle, to do nothing at all".
	The manner in which the AS-level was introduced showed no thought for the practicalities—certainly not enough. There is stress not only for the students, but also for the teaching staff. Timetabling becomes a nightmare, juggling with many more combinations of subjects not only throughout the year but also at examination time. The different boards for A-level and AVCE do not co-ordinate their dates, therefore a student may find herself or himself with three or four different exams crammed into a couple of days without a break. The staff have to spend hours supervising and the school budget for external examinations is unbelievably high. At Landau Forte, overall the annual budget for external exams rose by 20 per cent in the year in which AS-level exams were introduced. We are talking of thousands and thousands of pounds.
	My second worry concerns the Learning and Skills Council, which has been in place since April this year. It is a huge organisation operating through 47 local learning and skills councils, explicitly focusing on skills and employer needs at national, regional and local levels. That body will have responsibility for planning, funding, monitoring and improving the quality of post-16 up to higher education level. It will concentrate on work-based training for young people and adult and community education. There are many good things and the opportunity sounds good for those who have dropped out of school, or who realised that they wasted their time at school, or who rightly want to improve their qualifications. But surely it is not the right body to take the academic, the liberal arts and the teaching of history, for example.
	Perhaps I may draw your Lordships' attention to an article written by Nicholas Foulkes which appeared in last Saturday's Financial Times. He stated:
	"Knowledge is the absolute key to history. Without it you cannot hope to understand the past—or the present".
	Where does that fit into skills-based learning?
	The really sinister aspect of the new Learning and Skills Council is that from the academic year 2002-03 onwards the council will also take responsibility for the whole of school sixth form funding. Even now Ofsted inspectors are required to inspect school sixth forms in two ways: first, as a part of the school; and, secondly, as a post-16 unit. Do the Government intend to do away with school sixth forms altogether? What measure of control will they apply?
	I am not alone in my concern. Principals of specialist schools are anxious and apprehensive about the future funding of their sixth forms. The sixth form is an integral part of many fine schools. The specialist teachers of A-level subjects give and receive stimulus from sixth form teaching. At Landau Forte we have a vertical tutor group system. It is a delight to see the seniors giving help and encouragement to the juniors. This is especially true for junior boys who can see for themselves that the older boys are enjoying reading and learning a language and that it is not just a "sissy" thing to do.
	Recently one inspector came to Landau Forte to find out why our boys' results were so good. "What is the secret?", he asked the principal, who replied, "We teach them".
	I conclude with a simple plea to the Government. Please take care with new ideas which could cause unnecessary upheaval. There is so much that is good in so many of our schools. Over the years, I have visited a number of them in my capacity as a member of two advisory panels to grant-giving foundations. Please treat the teachers, especially head teachers, as professionals and work with them. As I believe President Kennedy said, if it is not necessary to change then it is necessary not to change.

Lord Dearing: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, for initiating the debate. I could not help noting that all the previous speakers included references to the AS-level. I confess that I have some responsibility for the AS-level. However, it may be worth looking back at what this villain wrote to the Conservative Government, I think it was in 1996. If I remember rightly, they were warned that there would be penalties if the system were unduly rushed—and I think that it was. An approach was suggested in the report. It focused on how the AS could be used with the A-level to give real breadth over three domains of knowledge.
	However, I have no intention to revisit my past adventures. I wish today to enter an entirely new area. If anyone were to interrupt my speech, it would be apparent that I could easily be floored on this subject. In this House I have been accustomed to hearing well-informed debates on education, schools, colleges, universities and, on occasion, lifelong learning facilitated by, for example, the UfI. But I want to speak about an issue which I do not recall being discussed but which I view as a necessary complement to what goes on in schools. It is necessary to complement the Government's wish to encourage staying on after 16 so that we catch up with other nations, improve standards in all our institutions, and achieve a 50 per cent participation rate in higher education by 2010. The necessary complement is apprenticeship.
	A report was published in September by a committee under the chairmanship of Sir John Cassels. It tells us that we have something which is valuable but we are not using it well enough and we have very real problems. My only purpose in speaking today is to commend the report to the House and the Government. Noble Lords will know as well as I do that with the big run-down of our major industries in the 1970s and 1980s the old apprenticeships fell with them. Attempts were made by the Government through the youth training scheme and, from 1995, through the modern apprenticeship to give a new impetus to apprenticeships. The Cassels committee tells us that while the elements of a good apprenticeship scheme exist, the goods have not been delivered and there are real faults.
	The noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, referred to arrangements in several mainland European countries. In France and Germany, they are well developed. Apprenticeships at the NVQ2 level are 30 per cent higher than in this country. At NVQ or above, in Germany the number is two-thirds greater than in this country.
	We have this strong commitment, which I support, to increasing the number of graduates. But—I say this from sensitive experience of trying to get someone to fit a floor, or to do some plastering or plumbing in my house—in our society the number of good craftsmen may be a touch shorter than that of graduates. In short, our society is distinctive not only in its approach to education but also in the way that we have not developed, as so many other countries have, a well-developed cadre of craftsmen and technicians. It is a fundamental weakness in the economy. The lack of a good scheme is a fundamental weakness in our arrangements for providing opportunities for all our young people to engage in developing themselves through training and education. We must have another highway for those youngsters who may not have academic talents or a taste for continuing in full-time education. Unless we have, we are wasting their talents.
	What are people saying about our present modern apprenticeships? The Cassels committee reports that they are poorly known about or understood; they are inconsistent in delivery; poorly managed; in the minds of employers they involve too much bureaucracy. I have also seen it argued that they may lack an adequate entitlement to education during the apprenticeship period.
	Research undertaken for the committee demonstrates that while many people know in general terms that there is this thing called a modern apprenticeship, when it comes down to detailed knowledge, that is not the picture. Eighty per cent of teachers have said that it is a lack of knowledge and adequate information that is likely to have been a barrier to the take up of apprenticeships by young people. Market research through focus groups of pupils has shown that they are generally regarded as a poor alternative to staying on in full-time education even though some groups of students thought that they might be unable to cope with A-levels. Young people pursuing modern apprenticeships wanted them to be more widely known and respected. We have a big problem.
	The committee made a battery of proposals but this is not the occasion to go into a long recital of them. I wish to mention a few of the key ones in order to promote knowledge of them. To raise the standard and the esteem in which they are held, the committee recommends the establishment of a national framework of apprenticeships which provide clear statements of their basic content and duration at two levels, foundation and advanced, with a national system for the award of diplomas by the national training organisations. There should be opportunities to progress from the advanced level into higher education and to an associate degree or perhaps a full degree. In other words, the committee recommends that there should be a national framework—a highway—for those who do not continue in full-time education but want to earn and learn.
	There should be proper apprenticeship agreements between the employer and the apprentice in all cases, including an individual training plan providing for both on-the-job training with the employer and off-the-job learning subject to external circumstances. I could go on because I have quite a list, but I shall not.
	Noble Lords should read the report because it contains good material. It goes so far as to ask whether we should be thinking about some objectives. Compared with the high figures for mainland Europe, as regards people between the ages of 25 and 28, 22 per cent have apprenticeship training. The Cassels committee is suggesting that we should aim for 28 per cent by 2004 and 35 per cent by 2010. Those are ambitious targets.
	As I well know, as someone who has written the odd report or two, it is one thing to do that and another for anything to happen. The people to whom the Cassels committee is looking to make things happen are the Government, of course, and the learning and skills councils which they see as funding the out of work training, which is the formal learning. But perhaps only the Government can rouse the enthusiasm of the CBI, the chambers of commerce and the trades unions because it is from there that the great pull has to come. I am hoping that the Government will have as much passion for this form of learning as they have for the formal learning which takes place in our schools, colleges and universities. I know that they welcome this report. I hope that they will wish to say more in due course and to state specifically what they intend to do.

Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I, too, would like to thank my noble friend Lord Pilkington for securing this very important debate. Before making my contribution I ought to declare an interest as chairman of the Engineering and Marine Training Authority, which is the national training organisation for engineering manufacture.
	Since being elected in 1997 this Government have sought to reform many aspects of the post-16 education structure and I welcome much of the work that has been done during that time in this area. The most significant has been the creation of the learning and skills councils replacing the TECs and the FEFC. The Careers Service has been replaced by what is called the Connexions Service and we have seen the introduction and then the suspension of individual learning accounts, the introduction and review of AS-levels and most recently an announcement that NTOs such as the EMTA are to be abolished and replaced by sector skills councils. I should perhaps refrain from commenting any more on the Government's plans for appointing sector skills councils since my own organisation is likely to be directly involved in that process.
	It is the relatively new learning and skills councils on which I should like to concentrate my remarks. I hope that your Lordships will understand if my comments are geared towards the engineering sector. I do that for two reasons. First, it is an issue about which I feel very strongly and, secondly, I suggest that some of the reasons for the skills shortages that the sector faces and which the Government are so keen to address and rightly so.
	At the outset I want to emphasise the importance of vocational education and the need for the learning and skills councils to ensure parity between the academic and college-based route on the one hand and the vocational route on the other. In the engineering sector the number of employees within engineering holding vocational qualifications is increasing. The number of those who hold vocational qualifications at higher or intermediate levels, degree level or above, has risen by 10 per cent in recent years. The number is now around 53 per cent.
	That change mainly reflects the supply side of the labour market. There has been a rising level of educational attainment in the population. In particular there is an increasing number staying on in post compulsory education. But it also reflects the shift in the sector to higher level occupations. Despite the increase in the numbers taking the vocational route, the number of young people taking the apprenticeship route to which the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, referred, in the engineering manufacture sector is not as high as we would wish and the completion rates are also considerably lower than we would wish.
	There are many reasons for the low take-up, but the main one is likely to be higher staying on rates at 16 combined with the poor image of engineering and work-based learning.
	The problem we face is straightforward. The higher calibre potential apprentices opt to take further qualifications and are no doubt rightly encouraged to do so by their schools and colleges. But that is not helped by the relatively poor and, from my own perspective, occasionally somewhat biased careers advice and guidance on engineering and work-based training which is given to young people.
	Young people following vocational studies in schools must be encouraged to consider the work-based route to qualifications as a worthwhile option. An apprenticeship in industry, with relevant part-time vocational educational support, is for many people a wholly desirable and preferable alternative to continuing in full-time education.
	I should like to mention the reference in today's Financial Times to a recent study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies on the value of vocational studies. Far from arguing that academic qualifications, particularly school-based qualifications, are much more valuable than vocational ones, the report suggests that those who achieve higher marks from the classroom experience actually perform better when taking vocational qualifications.
	However, the cost of vocational training, especially in the engineering sector, is very much higher than in other sectors. For example, the average cost for someone going through a modern apprenticeship is between £28,000 and £40,000 compared with business administration where the cost is only about £8,000. These high levels of costs associated with these qualifications become more of a problem with the disproportionate funding arrangements of the various TECs throughout the country. The level of funding made available was a matter for the local TEC provider. Now the learning and skills councils have a more national approach.
	It is my hope that the creation of the learning and skills councils will result in a more equitable funding regime. A national framework with no flexibility at local level and minimal autonomy is probably a move in the right direction.
	But, as with all new beasts, the transitional period from one regime to a new one is proving costly for many training organisations, not least the group training associations, and some are facing the prospect of closure. The problem arises from the contracts negotiated with the TECs and the funding of these by the learning and skills councils.
	Looking to the future, the engineering manufacture sector requires significantly more funding for 19 to 24 year-olds. Perhaps I may refer to some of the factors. As an NTO, EMTA is investing time, money and resources in promoting the vocational GCSE in engineering to ensure that sufficient young people are inspired to think about a career in engineering. The significance of our efforts lies in the ability to fund sufficient places in the 19 to 24 age group.
	Secondly, the recent report by Sir John Cassels, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Dearing—I pay tribute to Sir John, not only in regard to his report but in regard to his previous work as chairman of UK Skills, of which I have the honour to be a director—identified engineering as a leading sector in modern apprenticeships and cited it as a high-quality model, but one which is expensive to deliver.
	Thirdly, Sir John Cassels set a figure of 35 per cent as the completion rate for modern apprenticeships. I suggest that that will be a difficult target to achieve given the attraction of the higher education and further education routes to many young people. The Government's target of a 50 per cent participation rate for 18 to 30 year-olds is an added problem. As Sir John also identified, there is a significant lack of funding for 19 to 24 year-olds looking to complete vocational qualifications, having failed in terms of the higher education or further education routes.
	The noble Lord, Lord Dearing, referred at some length to the modern apprenticeship. I very much share his enthusiasm for that qualification. The modern apprenticeship is a raft of NVQs, brought together in a flexible way to meet the needs of the individual applicant, but above all to meet the needs of industry. In the first two or three years after the introduction of the modern apprenticeship, from 1995, the take-up rate increased acceptably. But in the past year or so it has levelled off to a considerable extent. I hope that, before long, once the economy lifts off again, the increase in the take-up rate of the modern apprenticeship will be resumed.
	We may need to give the learning and skills councils the benefit of the doubt in the next few years as they get to grips with the tasks that face them. We shall need watch carefully to see how the LSCs respond to these issues.
	I want to raise one final point; namely, the announcement by the Secretary of State that, by 2002, all training needs will be so-called framework training. This means that young people will no longer be able to undertake NVQs on their own. This detracts from the kind of flexibility that we are looking for in this area. I hope that the matter will be reviewed.

Lord Northbourne: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, for introducing this important subject.
	Good teaching is not enough. I shall attempt to persuade your Lordships on three matters: first, that family support is of fundamental importance to successful education outcomes; secondly, flowing from that, that there is a strong case for more support for parents to encourage and sustain them in that task; finally, I want to address briefly the problems of those who do not have family support.
	To establish my first point, perhaps I may quote extensively from recent research. For example, a group of workers at Cambridge analysed data from the British Household Panel Survey based on the lives of 1,000 young people. Their findings include the following:
	"Contrary to the assumption that Britain is becoming less family centred and more individualistic, family matters are by far and away regarded by our young adolescents as the most important aspect of their lives. Family communication and support matter enormously for whether young people are making a success of their lives".
	The study found that not only family background but also family interaction matters in tilting the odds in relation to the risky behaviour of young people and their success in education.
	A study at the City University found that:
	"the influence of socio-economic adversity is largely mediated through the material resources available to the family. Teenagers growing up in households where they had no room of their own, or possibly even a desk or table to do their homework, were less likely to do well in school. Over-crowded accommodation, frequent house moves, and shared use of facilities represent the sort of disadvantage that increases the risk of poor academic achievement, behavioural problems, poor health and ultimately adjustment problems in adulthood".
	A study by the School of Social Sciences at the University of Teesside found the following:
	"Despite the current rhetoric about a parenting deficit, most parents, whatever their circumstances, want to do their best for their children. With regard to education, numerous state initiatives recognise and attempt to harness this familial value. More significantly, the individualisation and commodification of learning is rendering family support increasingly critical. In consequence, differences in family supports raise issues of social policy, not just of social inequality but also in equality of opportunity".
	Finally, a Leeds university study concluded, in relation to the type of support that young people receive:
	"Financial support from parents is irregular, discretionary and negotiated.
	"Only about 10% of parents made regular monthly payments to their children aged 16-25".
	It goes on to state:
	"Families play a pivotal role in many unemployed young people's lives. Sudden drops in income due to unemployment enforced reliance on parental assistance. Parents lend money and provide free board and lodging. They and the wider family endeavour to keep young people involved in social and family networks, often providing them with the financial means to do this. However, reliance on parents was seen as a forced choice. Many unemployed young people were concerned about being dependent because their parents were themselves on low incomes. Although most parents appeared willing to give financial and material help to their young adult offspring, they were not always able to do so".
	All those statistics and studies, and many others, point to the conclusion that parents and the state must work together if we want to achieve, in the national interest, good educational outcomes for 16 to 25 year-olds. It goes without saying that, without such education, young people will have little hope in life and society will be the poorer.
	Families are the guardians of the social capital. As I have shown, they can make an enormous difference to the educational attainment of children. So surely the state ought to do more to support parents with post-16 children in education or training. Will the Minister draw the attention of her right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the advantages of this excellent investment?
	I now turn briefly my third and final point. What about those 16 to 25 year-olds who do not have a functional, supportive family? What are their chances of getting further education and training? Unless they get help, I fear that their chances are slim indeed.
	Some succeed against all the odds simply through their personality and determination, but many more could succeed if they had more help. What kind of help do they need? They need, in essence, someone to replace the support they would have had from their family. It has to be said that it is a waste of time offering the best education and the best teaching in the world unless young people have that support. They need some way to acquire the means they need to live on and the money they need to live on. They need somewhere to belong. Housing is all very well but what they need is a surrogate home. They need motivation, hope, self-confidence and courage to believe that they can win through.
	My wife is chairman of a charity, one of the departments of which is called "Moving Forward". It operates in Kent from Margate through to Dartford. In each centre there is a key worker who goes out on the streets, is known in the area and has a small room or office somewhere near the centre. That person seeks out young people who are lost, excluded and disadvantaged and are not "connecting". In most of the places where the charity operates it also has a drop-in centre. The key worker invites the young person back for a cup of coffee and asks him or her whether they want somewhere to live. The young person replies, "That would be marvellous". The key worker says, "All right, you can have somewhere to live. We shall help you but you must also help us". They negotiate a contract by which the young person agrees to undertake training and to try to be a responsible tenant of the accommodation which is provided. The key worker works with that young person. Sometimes in the first few weeks he or she may have to visit that young person every day. But gradually the young person learns to be a householder and a responsible tenant. They probably fall down on their training and need to be picked up again in a way that parents would do if they had parents. They have the drop-in centre as a centre of belonging. The process works.
	That may not be the only formula. An enormous amount of resources, effort and dedication would be needed to extend that service across the country, but it might be a good investment. The kind of education or training which is offered also matters. It must seem relevant to the young person and attainable. It must also be delivered by people the young person respects. The noble Lord, Lord Dearing, referred to apprenticeships. I believe that is one route by which young people can work alongside adults they respect. Let us face it, the kind of young people I am talking about do not necessarily respect academics.
	Backed by educational support of that kind and given hope, many young men and women will try hard to make up lost ground. Frankly, I cannot see how the right kind of help can be given to all those young people who need it without substantial support from the taxpayer. Can the Government give any hope that this important gateway to education will be open to young people, especially those who do not have family support?

Lord Lucas: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Pilkington for giving us the opportunity of this debate. I hope indeed that we are in for a few years of debate. We have had some fairly radical changes in post-16 education and I think a period now of gradual change but, above all, a great deal of discussion and analysis would be a good precedent to set for the way we move on education in this country.
	My noble friend Lord Pilkington is quite right to say that we really ought to take a close look at what is happening overseas, or even overland. The Scots are tackling this same problem. However, we do not seem to be paying much attention to what they are doing. There are some interesting things going on in Europe, as opposed to just the systems that exist there. The ways the Europeans are looking at changing their systems are also extremely interesting. I hope that we shall have the benefit of other occasions when people who know about them—I do not claim to know about them in sufficient detail—will be able to tell us what the current thinking is in the likes of France, Germany and Italy. That might inform the way we look to make the next major change in this area which may be five or 10 years ahead of us.
	In that context I am terribly disappointed that there are no contributions in this debate from Back-Bench Labour or Back-Bench Liberals. I have benefited a great deal in the past from listening to my colleagues on those Benches. It is sad that they are not here today. I hope that that will not be the case on future education debates. We are all the poorer for it and it does not show those parties off in a good light.
	I shall tackle a couple of fairly minor points first. This debate is about post-16 education. I should like to get away from the "16" in that. The more I see schools, the way results come through and the pressures put on schools, the more I think it is better to think in terms of a year group. There are many reasons why a kid might in the course of 12 years of education slip a year behind. It may just be some hiatus in their life or they may have some degree of special educational need which requires some intensive attention at some point in their career. But one of the most enduring educational statistics is that those who come to school younger—those who are the young starters rather than those who start school almost a year older—just because of their birthdays do about half a grade worse at A-level.
	That has been the case in every single year's statistics I have looked at and I am sure that it is the case now. We must look at a more flexible system where we do not just disadvantage kids because they are born in August. We should allow them, if it is right, to drop back a year. The main disincentive to that at the moment and to schools being allowed to look at the kid rather than look at the system is the fact that we report the GCSE results as age 16 rather than as a year group. We need to look at that point. It is starting to have a larger and larger effect on the way schools treat kids as there are fewer and fewer other things to do to improve one's league table position which is something that schools and parents still care about.
	I should like to hear the Minister comment on the way the LSC is developing its thinking on school sixth forms. I am starting to hear some things that concern me. I do not know the truth of the matter so perhaps the Minister will be able to inform me. I hear that there is a proposal to reserve 15 per cent of A-level funding and pay it only if the child passes the examination. That would be a very bad precedent to set and I hope that that is wrong. I am also told that the LSC is considering taking powers or using powers to forbid a school to offer a subject at A-level if only one or two kids wish to study it. The LSC considers that that is uneconomic and that schools should not do it. I hope that schools will be allowed to take those decisions. I am also told that there are worries that the LSC will compel schools to combine sixth forms with those of neighbouring schools and will not allow that to be a free decision on the part of schools. I hope that I am wrong and I should very much like to be given some comfort from the Minister on that matter.
	I turn to two subjects which I hope we shall allow ourselves to think about over the years. The first subject involves breadth. The changes that have been made and the principles that lie behind AS-levels were right. My daughter, who is now 17, benefited enormously from being able to continue two extra subjects at AS-level. There was a chaotic start, and it was a hard year for her but a good principle is involved and it is a good route to have gone down. I regret the loss of what would otherwise have been done during her first-year sixth—all the external broadening has been much compressed. We should not lose that; part of what makes people interesting human beings is that they are not just educated but grow in understanding and enjoyment of the world outside education.
	We should look closely at the IB—the international baccalaureate—not least because Nick Tate appears to be taking it up. Having devised AS-levels, he is now said to be putting the IB into Winchester. It is a respected examination—it provides more breadth, albeit perhaps only for the more academic portion of a school. We should not reject it or turn our backs on it just because we did not invent it here. We should also examine the way in which SATs have evolved in the United States. American parents who work in London for a period and who then go backwards and forwards between the United States and this country say to me that the main difference between an 18 year-old English kid and an 18 year-old American is that the English kid knows more but that the American kid understands more. We should not forget that although it is important to get the answer it is also important to understand the answer. Other systems secure that better than ours does.
	I turn to the last but perhaps most important area; namely, vocational education. I very much enjoyed the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, who is going down entirely the right route. It is important that vocational education should enjoy parity of esteem with academic education. The roots of that approach have to begin in secondary school. Kids have to see vocational education as an equally valuable option. As the noble Lord said, there should not be a one-way division; one has to be able to find one's way back to the academic approach if that is right.
	We have to do what has been done so successfully in Singapore, where many of those who take the vocational route will end up founding and running big companies. People who take the vocational route should have access to the basic academic skills and some of the academic breadth that make it possible for them to hold their own in the company of those who took the academic route. The fact that kids are doing carpentry, for example, is no reason why they should be cut off from culture, history or whatever else interests them about the world.
	We must recognise that if we do not seriously give children a choice between the academic and vocational routes, many of the kids who end up in university will end up doing the wrong courses for the wrong reasons; they will accumulate very large debts obtaining a skill that is of no use to them. They would have been much better served if they had gone down a different route.

The Viscount of Oxfuird: My Lords, we are again indebted to my noble friend Lord Pilkington for pointing out the importance of education. This is a very timely debate, in which I must declare two interests: first, I am the president of the Institute for Supervision and Management; and secondly—and more crucially—I am the father of an 18 year-old son, who has just endured AS-levels and who is now studying for his A-levels.
	I want to make the shortest of interventions—I shall make three very brief points. I start with the quite sad AS-levels. I do so with the bitter experience of having seen my son and his friends battle with them. The introduction of the AS-level has placed an unrecognisable burden on pupils in year 12. That should be a year of learning that should be for trained thought rather than for facing the quite unrealistic demands of AS-level exams. That was particularly true in the case of people such as my son, who suffers from dyslexia.
	My second point relates to the rubric on examination papers. I was horrified to see a mock examination paper that was prepared by one of the awarding bodies for art A-level. So unclear were the instructions that they should have been submitted to the Plain English Campaign for scrutiny. For a boy suffering from dyslexia, understanding the instructions has affected in a major way his chances of achieving the innovative section of the practical in that exam. That consideration must also apply to others.
	My third point relates to vocational education and training. It is not enough for us to say that there should be parity of esteem between the academic and vocational routes. The vocational route should not be considered a second-class option. If we are serious about addressing the skills shortage, particularly in disciplines such as engineering and IT, we need to make those subjects attractive to a much wider range of people.
	I listened with great interest to the speech of my noble friend Lord Trefgarne, who is not currently in his place. I have known of his organisation, the Engineering and Marine Training Authority, for several years and I appreciate his reluctance to address the issue of sector skills councils. However, having read the recent policy guidance, I trust that in replacing NTOs—I accept the Government's wish not to simply re-brand NTOs—the Government will not fall into the trap of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I also hope that organisations such as the Engineering and Marine Training Authority will be licensed as one of the sector skills councils.

Lord Skidelsky: My Lords, I add my thanks to those that noble Lords have already extended to the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, for initiating this debate. I take it that "post-16 education" includes higher education. I shall concentrate on that, although other noble Lords have not attended this debate with the intention of discussing that sector.
	I start by quoting from a speech that was made by Estelle Morris, the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, on 22nd October. She said:
	"Over the last ten to twenty years, the higher education system has seen a huge shift from being an elite to a mass system, but without anyone necessarily thinking strategically about what we want universities to be achieving. As we expand further we need to give this more thought".
	What an astonishing admission; but one which, I fear, is all too true. We saw another example of it in the latest U-turn over funding. It was tuition fees yesterday and graduate tax today; what tomorrow? How wonderful the response of the Secretary of State to this anarchic process of policy-making has been. I repeat that she said:
	"As we expand further we need to give this more thought".
	I am the last person to object to more thinking, but would it not have been better to have done the thinking before the expansion? Even now, would it not be better to say, "Well, let us halt the expansion while we do some more thinking; then we will decide how much further we want to carry the expansion"? But no; the Government were already committed to the target of getting 50 per cent of the population who are under 30 into higher education by 2010. This year's expansion of 5.5 per cent has been welcomed by the Secretary of State. She said,
	"we are well on our way".
	Well on our way to what?
	I fear that the Government have only one purpose: to increase access to higher education by young people from unskilled and manual working class backgrounds. The Secretary of State has said that,
	"none of us can defend the position"
	whereby only 14 per cent of such young people go into higher education compared with 74 per cent from professional grounds. She adds that,
	"that gap has not narrowed in recent times".
	I leave aside the fact that the figures do not add up; 74 per cent and 14 per cent make 98 per cent. I do not know what has happened to the remaining 2 per cent.
	I agree that there is a waste of talent at the lower end, but that is subject to two qualifications. First, we must remember that the proportion of the manual working class in the population as a whole has been constantly shrinking so that there is much less waste in quantitative terms than 20 or 30 years ago. Access has been continually widening. Secondly, it is far from clear that universities are the best places for all young people to acquire the skills needed in a modern economy. That point has been made by the noble Lords, Lord Pilkington and Lord Dearing, and other contributors. Germany has a lower participation ratio in higher education but a more skilled labour force than the UK.
	We have not started to think about what we are doing to the distinctive function of universities by making them the top tier of the school system rather than places which offer specifically academic education for those with the aptitude to benefit from it. Of course the Secretary of State makes the right noises. The universities are to have a
	"rich complexity of differing missions"
	and
	"expansion must be achieved without any compromise on excellence and quality".
	I fear that they are noises. A diversity of missions cannot be achieved without unequal funding. As the late Lord Beloff used to say, it costs more to produce a Rolls-Royce than a Mini.
	The pass on excellence and quality has already been sold. Pace Kingsley Amis, more need not have meant worse, but it has meant worse because ever since the 1980s governments have underfunded university expansion and failed to protect the international status of our best universities. I give just two figures which are well known to anyone who has taken part in these debates. First, the level of public funding per student fell by 50 per cent between 1980 and 1999, resulting in a rise in the student:staff ratio from 9.1 per cent to 17.1 per cent. Secondly, since 1980 the average pay of academic staff has increased by only 70 per cent of average non-manual pay in the economy and 80 per cent of public sector pay. This makes it more difficult to recruit and retain academic staff in competition with other academic jobs not only in this country but abroad, particularly in the United States. The attempt to keep up quality in face of declining relative pay and conditions has led to increasingly intrusive regulation of both research and teaching.
	Despite all the fine words of the Secretary of State, the Government have not begun to address the problem of the underfunding of higher education. All government funding initiatives going back to the 1990s have been designed to save the Government money without increasing the total amount of money flowing into the university system. For example, a couple of years ago the Government graciously allowed universities to charge students £1,000 tuition fees, and promptly clawed back most of it by economising on the block grant. Now the talk is of replacing tuition fees and reintroducing maintenance grants by means of a graduate tax. What do we think about that?
	Mr Martin Wolf writing in the Financial Times on 29th October made four devastating criticisms of the graduate tax proposal, which I hope the Government will take into account in their review. First, it would bring no new money into the universities; secondly, it would reinforce the crippling dependence of the universities on the whims of government; thirdly, unlike market-led user charges it would create no cross-related incentives for either students or universities; and, fourthly, university graduates already pay for the benefits of their education through taxes. Therefore, one is simply introducing an extra tax.
	The purpose of the rethink on tuition fees appears to be confined to only one matter: the removal of the deterrent effect on poor students of embarking on higher education. But, as Mr Wolf points out, this could best be done by targeted schemes of maintenance grants and tuition scholarships.
	There are only two ways to get more money into the university system: either the taxpayer must pay a lot more to restore "excellence and quality" and then maintain them as expansion continues, or universities themselves must be allowed to charge market prices for their courses without being under constant threat of having their existing level of grants reduced pro rata. My instinct is to support the second of these two alternatives because I do not believe that predominant reliance on public funding, even on a more generous scale, will protect the best universities from an inexorable process of dumming down. In others words, I do not believe that public funding can be differentiated enough—the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, was very keen on that differentiation—to protect the best.
	All the forces of egalitarianism will push towards uniform provision, just as they do in the school system. It will be called levelling up, but I fear that it will be levelling down. There is a trade-off between equality and the distinctive things that universities stand for: excellence, freedom and truth. The existence of that trade-off is best recognised by a system of mixed public/private funding. I hope that we move in that direction. I fear that unless the Secretary of State grasps this nettle she will bring no more comfort to higher education than her predecessors have done.

Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, I too compliment my noble friend on securing this debate. As we are all aware, he has devoted his life to the cause of education. I hope that the Government will heed his words and those of other noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, for introducing the subject of university education. I must declare a very honourable interest as president of the University of Wales College of Medicine. That is an excellent college which enjoys a high reputation for medical research and teaching. It is a national institution in Wales. Although the college is centred on the University of Wales Hospital at Cardiff, it is connected with the rest of the university sector through training placements with hospitals and GPs throughout the Principality.
	My remarks will be largely about the difficulties being encountered in providing higher education in that all-important area of health and medicine. The University of Wales, including our college, is now the responsibility of the National Assembly which is conducting its own review of higher education, but the problems that I shall describe are not confined to Wales and are prevalent in other medical schools in England. We should not forget that health and medical students numerically represent some 12½ per cent of the higher education sector in the United Kingdom.
	It is hardly necessary for me to stress the importance to the NHS of all kinds of medical education. The NHS is dependent on our medical schools for the majority of its front line health care professionals. It goes without saying that we cannot hope to have a first-class health service without a steady inflow of first-class graduates from our medical schools.
	The Government recognise the basic needs of the NHS in human resource terms. They have increased substantially the number of student places available in recent years. But, quite frankly, that is not enough. There are currently grave concerns about whether the places available can be filled. The number of applicants for medicine and dentistry has fallen sharply by some 16 per cent in the five years between 1995 and 2000, and there have been even greater falls in some subsidiary areas. I understand that several medical schools had to go through clearing at UCAS to fill places for this academic year. Other professions—physiotherapy, radiography and occupational therapy—are also threatened by a dearth of applicants for entry to them. We are losing rather than gaining ground. The question is: why? Universities UK sums up the matter by stating:
	"It, therefore, seems medicine might have become a less attractive career to prospective students. This might be because it is perceived to be only for high academic achievers or because the longer term career prospects and working conditions are not attractive to young people".
	Let me consider that in the context of the microcosm of my own college. That college has been asked to take another 100 students on top of the 350 that we already have. Of course we shall respond positively to that. But our capacity, along with that of the other higher education institutions in Wales with which we collaborate closely, has reached saturation point. We badly need more investment in student accommodation and ancillary facilities of the quality that will attract students in this day and age.
	Medical courses are of longer duration than other academic courses and require a strong sense of vocation as well as dedication to complete. That may be a factor which accounts for the fall in the number of applicants for places at medical schools along with lack of financial support, the prospect of debt and the prospect of more lucrative rewards offered by other careers.
	I am told that the National Assembly for Wales may try to follow the Scottish proposal which provides that tuition fees are paid at the end of higher education courses rather than as they proceed. Again I refer to the views of Universities UK. It quite rightly states:
	"There's also a lot of confusion about tuition fees. Too many people from lower socio-economic groups believe they have to pay these fees when most will be completely exempt from them. [It is a fact that] 50 per cent of all students will pay nothing at all towards the costs of their higher education".
	Its statement goes on:
	"Universities UK is opposed to scrapping tuition fees. We believe that those who can afford to make an upfront contribution to the costs of their higher education should do so. Universities rely on this substantial income stream and any radical change in this system would jeopardise their financial stability, unless the government was prepared to fill this gap in income completely".
	It is not just the fall in student applications that is causing concern. There is also a shortage of high-quality teaching and research staff. There were no fewer than 79 vacant professorial chairs in medical schools according to a recent survey by the Council of Heads of Medical Schools.
	I regard that as a dismal situation under a Government that promised to give a high priority to education and to increase education spending as a proportion of national income. Their failure to fulfil their promises and the deteriorating position we are faced with will have devastating consequences. I have concentrated on the health field, but of course there are other areas of our national life which will be similarly adversely affected by a lack of investment in higher education.
	I strongly advise the Government, in their own interests and those of the NHS, to consider the situation very carefully if they want to ensure for the future that we have an adequate supply of frontline staff in the NHS. A holistic approach is certainly required which takes account not only of the maintenance of student numbers but the overall quality of the institutions where we educate them.
	Finally, I agree with a substantial amount of the statement by Universities UK that:
	"It is crucial that [in] any shake-up in student support funding is not achieved at the expense of universities. Universities UK will be making it very clear in our submission to the forthcoming spending review that we need significant additional investment in our universities to ensure that the students we want to attract are being well served. We have world class provision that will be in jeopardy if we don't get new money for teaching infrastructure, and student support services".
	That very adequately sums up the case that I have sought to make.
	I should have liked to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, into the area of apprenticeship schemes and vocational education generally. That is an area which has lacked attention over a number of years. I have profound sympathy with those young people who are not academically qualified and cannot have the kind of university higher education that we have been talking about, but who certainly deserve the very best by way of vocational education according to their abilities and the country's needs.

Lord Addington: My Lords, I first must apologise for not having had my name down in time to appear on the main list. That is my fault. I shall in future always check more carefully.
	I want to refer to an area which has not so far been touched on in the debate; that is, post-16 education for a group of disabled people where education means education in life skills. We have heard much talk about examinations and so on, and about preparing people for work and for going on to university. There are two groups which have inspired me to make this intervention. The first group is those with learning disabilities. I have received briefing information from Mencap. The second group are those with autism and autism spectrum. These groups actually need support and help from colleges—an ongoing process from their schooling days—in such things as life skills.
	I shall not bore noble Lords with a second-hand badly regurgitated definition of autism, but basically autistics are people who have problems relating to the outside world. They have terrible trouble socialising. One must teach those with autism about those little white lies that one must use in society. For example, if someone asks whether they look nice, one does not tell them the truth every time. Another example is that if a person has an obsessive-compulsive disorder, he must be told that he should not talk about his obsession with maps or timetables for several hours.
	Training for people with autistic conditions is valuable since it could well be directed at those with considerable academic achievement. What they need, provided within their colleges, is help and training to cope with day to day life processes. If such students do not receive any training, they may well be incapable of leaving home, becoming increasing burdens on ageing parents and, once those parents are no longer there, becoming terribly isolated and in need of institutionalisation.
	For very different reasons, Mencap has drawn attention to a similar situation in its field. The charity has commented that considerable improvements have been made in this area, but also highlighted the following problem:
	"There is some evidence to suggest that despite the changes brought about by the Learning and Skills Act . . . some providers are still fixated by the belief that all learning has to lead to some form of accreditation in order for it to be funded. This is not the case and it is unhelpful for this myth to be still current".
	We need to take into account that that opinion is supported in the Government White Paper, Valuing People, published by the Department of Health.
	Whenever I contribute to a debate, I seem always to return to the promise of joined-up government. This problem has been brought forward again and again. We need to reach a point where colleges are encouraged to take on life skills training roles, even though the results will not appear on any league tables or earn a qualification or form of accreditation. Unless the Government can take the lead and offer guidance in this area, then we may well be letting down a sizeable percentage of the population, affecting not only the people directly involved, but also their parents and wider families.

Baroness Walmsley: My Lords, I, too, should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington of Oxenford, for introducing the debate. I am sure that my noble friend Lady Sharp of Guildford, who is in Bosnia this week, will be sorry to have missed it. I am also quite sure that she would have heartily endorsed the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, as regards the salary levels of university teachers. Although the Motion in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, is broad, as has been demonstrated by the wide range of points that have been made, in the main I intend to confine my remarks to provision for the 16 to 19 year-old age range.
	It has to be said that the changes that have taken place in the post-16 curriculum over the past couple of years have not met with universal acclaim. In fact, I think that I can safely say that they have attracted major criticism from every interested group.
	Liberal Democrats want to see a structure where access, inclusion, participation, breadth and quality are the standards by which the system is judged. Students in schools, sixth-form and FE colleges, as well as the modern apprenticeships advocated by the noble Lords, Lord Dearing and Lord Trefgarne, all need a flexible, credit-based system which recognises that not everyone will go on to university and in which credits can be accumulated and transferred between courses. We applaud the Government's attempt to bridge the gap between the academic and vocational strands of post-16 education, but recently I heard one head teacher describe what has been done to the curriculum for 16 to 19 year-olds as nothing less than a tragedy.
	I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, that the effect of the introduction of AS-levels has not been to broaden the sixth-form curriculum but, in many cases, has had the opposite effect. I have been approached by the parents of sixth-formers in great distress about the state of their children. The parents report that their children are not having any fun because they do not have the time to participate in any of the enriching activities which are so important at that age. When a student is taking four AS-levels, plus PSE, RE and careers advice, that takes up 40 out of 50 periods. They then have to undertake private study, research and homework. When do they take up music? Where is the time for drama? How can they find time for sport or the Young Enterprise Scheme? The uptake of general studies, a genuinely broad exam subject, has already fallen.
	The present generation of sixth-formers are the guinea pigs for a policy that has not been thought through. I wonder whether the Minister can tell the House whether her department has looked seriously at the possibility of evolving the current system into a baccalaureate-style scheme, based on the widely recognised, well-established and broad-based qualification. The National Assembly for Wales is leading the way. It is piloting a Welsh baccalaureate quite different from the French version which will be interesting to watch. Students will be able to choose either an academic or a vocational route, each providing core subjects and an element of choice that allows for the beginnings of a specialisation. The idea was a key pledge of the Liberal Democrat 1999 manifesto for the Welsh Assembly with a view to providing equal recognition of academic and vocational qualifications in post-16 examinations. I look forward to the evaluation with great interest.
	I turn now to the matter of planning and funding post-16 education. While it makes sense for the Learning and Skills Council to plan for provision across regions, the level of funding of students in the different establishments providing for them is a matter of great concern. One might have hoped that the discrepancy between FE colleges and schools could have been levelled up rather than down. In fact, funding appears to have reduced across the board for new students in both sectors. Until now, school places have averaged an annual £3,500 per place, while FE places have averaged £3,050. In future, both will receive only £2,600 for each new student, which represents a serious real-terms decrease, despite all the reassurances given by the Government when the Learning and Skills Act 2000 was going through Parliament.
	Although funding has been guaranteed for the first 16 months, growing sixth forms and FE colleges will lose out. The 3 per cent built-in inflation figure is likely to prove inadequate. I shall give an example: in one sixth form that I know of, last year the LEA built in a 3.6 per cent inflation figure. If, next year, the teachers' pay settlement is greater than 3 per cent, say 3.6 per cent, it would cost that school £50,000, or two teachers. Where is the incentive to expand the sixth form in that kind of system?
	If the Government want schools to increase the magic figure of pupils gaining five A to C grade GCSEs and thereby gain access to the sixth form—as a precursor to their objective of getting 50 per cent of young people into higher education—then I respectfully suggest that they are going about it the wrong way and are in great danger of shooting themselves in the foot.
	It is disingenuous to assume that post-16 school funding can be disaggregated from that for 11 to 16 years. The Government have redirected funding to key stage 3, which all would agree demanded attention. However, if sixth-form funding is cut, schools will support their sixth forms from the rest of the budget. That will threaten the Government's own targets for the remainder of the school.
	No one pretends that the funding formula matches the reality on the ground. It is only a means of allocating a global figure. For example, my local comprehensive school spends double its allocation on support staff, as do many schools. However, the Government cannot give schools the power to deploy budgets as they see fit and then complain about how that is done. Government-imposed targets in one area will always have an impact on another area unless both are adequately funded, since naturally all schools will try to reach the targets.
	The bottom line is this: is the global figure big enough to provide the right quality of education for children? In opposition, the Labour Party committed itself to wholesale reform of local government funding, but that has not happened. The system presents particular problems for those at the bottom of the league table for LEA funding. While a small cut in the per capita allowance for sixth formers may not present quite such a problem for those at the top of the list, it is certainly more than a challenge for those counties at the bottom, such as my own home county of Cheshire, where schools have no slack in their budgets. Where the global figure is so inadequate, a cut of the order that I have described can be enough to put a school's budget into deficit.
	No doubt the Minister will tell noble Lords about the millions of pounds of extra funding that the Government are putting into schools, but much of that is not available to moderately successful schools in areas where the percentage of free school meals is low. Many examples can be cited of where the effects of ring-fenced funding have not been thought through. One school I encountered was delighted to receive funding for a great many new computers. However, that school has had to put aside £70,000 per year in order to cover the cost of technical assistance, maintenance and replacement of the equipment every four years. Where is that money coming from? I mention that case as an example of why schools cannot be expected to find extra moneys to make up the anticipated shortfall in sixth-form funding because of other pressures.
	The chronic shortage of specialist teachers in certain national curriculum subjects has a disproportionate effect on students in the 16 to 19 age range. It is at the advanced levels in any subject that the lack of a degree in that subject matters most. Although this Government were highly critical of the previous government's failure to plan for an adequate supply of specialist teachers, they have failed to solve the problem themselves.
	Secondary vacancies have trebled under this Government according to their own figures. There is now an army of supply teachers keeping our schools going. Wastage is high, teacher absence through illness is worryingly high, and the Government have seen fit to reduce their targets for the number of postgraduate teacher training places. Demographic changes notwithstanding, this is a staggering and unjustifiable strategy.
	I now turn to the Cinderella of the education service, the further education sector. Further education colleges face enormous difficulties under this Government, and the Conservatives seem to have no policies to support them as only five months ago in the general election their manifesto did not mention further education at all.
	I have mentioned already the cut in funding for places for 16 to 19 year-olds, but the suspension of individual learning accounts for adult learners, and the uncertainties about what will replace them, present a major problem for planners and managers in FE. The Government say that they want to cut red tape, and yet they allow 73 different funding streams and overcomplicate access to the standards fund, and there are major concerns about the way in which performance tables are compiled.
	The level of service from the DfES is also of concern. There are currently 500,000 full-time equivalent 16 to 19 year-olds in FE colleges compared to 400,000 in schools, and yet the number of senior officials looking after policy in FE colleges does not appear to be proportionate. Perhaps the Minister can tell us how the numbers in the two sectors compare.
	I end by urging the Government to pay particular attention to the 16 to 19 age range. It is the gateway to one of the Government's most ambitious objectives of increasing access to higher education. We must get it right. But I make a plea for no further changes or initiatives until there is widespread consultation and the whole scheme is fully thought through.

Baroness Blatch: My Lords, I, too, thank my noble friend Lord Pilkington for the opportunity to debate this issue. He made some cogent criticisms of AS-levels, to which I shall return. It has been an excellent, if short, debate, which has touched on many aspects of 16-plus education.
	It is not possible to discuss this subject without reference to one of the most serious teacher shortages in years—not only because of the number of vacancies, which is serious enough, but because of the unprecedented number of supply teachers who are being used to cover for the lack of full-time teachers. There is also a problem with the number of teachers who are teaching subjects for which they are not trained.
	In so many answers by Ministers—here, in another place and, indeed, before Select Committees—on the issue of teacher shortages, there has been an air of complacency. So often one hears Ministers say that while there is more to do, and while we should not be complacent, there are nevertheless more teachers in post than ever before and the shortage represents only a small percentage of all posts.
	Any visit to schools will show that there is a real problem of teacher recruitment and retention. Even where vacancies are filled, it is frequently the case that schools have very little choice but to take the only applicant, or appoint one from a very small number of applicants. Over time, whether we like it or not, that is bound to affect standards.
	For school-based 16-plus education, there is much anxiety. Let me say for the record that expressing concerns about school-based 16-plus education does not imply criticism of sixth-form colleges or further education, which was referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. I believe firmly in choice and diversity at 16-plus.
	As to funding—to which reference has been made—since the setting up of the wholly unaccountable learning and skills councils there has been considerable anxiety about the future funding of sixth forms. There is little confidence in the Government's promise that sixth form funding would not suffer as a result of the introduction of learning and skills councils. The Government have introduced an incredibly bureaucratic system where the learning and skills councils pass money down to the local education authorities, and the local education authorities have then to struggle to pass it on to the sixth forms.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Brigstocke, referred to the learning and skills councils concentrating solely on skills-based learning, perhaps at the expense of pure academic learning. I agree that there have to be pathways going in distinct directions, but one should be able to travel from one kind of education to another.
	The future of sixth forms is at risk. There is a crisis of confidence in our schools about their future. Again it is believed that over time the learning and skills councils will favour the closure of school-based sixth forms, and the most vulnerable will be those in our rural communities.
	In a Written Answer to my honourable friend Damian Green in another place, the Minister admitted that pupils who attend schools with sixth forms achieve better results than those who attend schools without them. Mr Ivan Lewis said:
	"The proportion of 15-year-olds that achieved five or more GCSEs at A* to C was (a) 52.2 per cent. in schools with sixth forms and (b) 42.2 per cent. in schools without sixth forms".—[Official Report, Commons, 12/11/01; col. 539W.]
	Further pressures on school-based sixth forms have arisen through the far from trouble free introduction of AS-levels. The combination of GCSEs, GNVQs, AS and A-levels has presented problems of timetabling, overlapping of examinations and bunching of examinations at the end of the school year, and has created huge pressures on teachers and students. Whether or not they are right in principle, the advocation and the introduction of AS-levels has caused great stress.
	The Government have created the worst of all worlds for students taking AS-levels. As my noble friend said, they do not necessarily broaden the experience of sixth formers and there is confusion about their value. Are students who fail AS-levels supposed to resit them in their final year?
	What comfort is there for current year students who have heard Ministers admit that there are problems with AS-levels and who understand that they are being reviewed—and yet they continue to have to take them in this current year?
	The former head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, Dr Nick Tate, admitted:
	"I don't think we fully thought out all the available options before we added a new tier of exams".
	The National Association of Headteachers criticised the new A-level system in May. It complained that Curriculum 2000 is damaging students and schools. It conducted a straw poll among its members and found that 60 per cent believed that post-16 reforms were not working and that 40 per cent thought they were working only partially. The National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers warned that confusion over the new system is discouraging young people from entering the sixth form.
	There has also been much criticism of the vocational qualification. The failure rate for the new vocational A-level is as high as 90 per cent in some subjects. Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Liverpool University, said:
	"Vocational A levels have been ill-thought out. They have recast GNVQs in the same shape as A levels, adding another academic route rather than a good form of practical education for employment".
	The Government have made much of life-long learning, and none of us can argue with that. But the individual learning accounts were introduced with a great flourish and, I am afraid, they have ended in tears. Only today, I received a press release from the Department for Education and Skills, in which the Minister, Mr Healey, took business leaders to task for not doing enough to tackle the problem of skill shortages. The press release stated:
	"The Adult Skills Minister John Healey...told business leaders that they needed to do much more to tackle the problem of skills shortages facing the economy. This follows"—
	so the DfES states,
	"the publication of the 'Skills in England 2001' report, which showed that 1 in 10 employers had experienced the problem of skill shortages".
	This is the very document that pledged to continue and expand the individual learning accounts, which was published only two days before the same department announced their suspension. That story beggars belief.
	From the introduction of individual learning accounts, the department was warned of problems with the administration of the scheme. Hundreds of complaints were received every month. It is not good enough for the Government to claim both that the number of complaints was relatively small compared with the overall number of accounts awarded and that the problem was so severe that, with no warning or consultation, the scheme had to be abandoned.
	The tragedy of this sorry saga is that the genuine providers and students have been badly let down. Providers are going out of business and some are left with considerable debts. Students are being abandoned and jobs will be lost. Real training opportunities for those on low incomes, who would most have benefited from the scheme, will be lost to education and training. What scheme will replace the ILA and when will it be in place? Is there any chance that the bona fide providers, who are the great majority, can be thrown a lifeline?
	What progress is being made on the student finance review? What is the timescale for the review? When is it envisaged that the new scheme will be in place? Who is to be consulted and how? If the proposals that were leaked recently in the press are to believed, students will continue to be equally disadvantaged. Because the review is to be carried out by officials, it is unlikely that there will be wide participation by external interested bodies. I hope that the Minister will be able to disabuse me of that view.
	I have sympathy with the view expressed in a recent publication by the Institute of Directors, which touched on expansion in higher education. It stated:
	"The expansion of student numbers may have had beneficial consequences. For example, it has resulted in an increase in the proportion of well-educated people for business to employ and so has helped to ease skill shortages in some areas. On the other hand, the increase in student numbers may have adversely affected standards. Fears persist that some new degree programmes are not as demanding as the more traditional subjects. This is not a matter of arcane debate, for the present Government is committed to a further expansion of higher education. Following the Dearing Report, the Government announced that it wanted to see 50 per cent of those aged up to 30 receive higher education by 2010".
	As the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, said, the expansion of higher education does not necessarily address some of the key issues.
	The institute also stated:
	"Clearly, British business needs a well-educated workforce in order to enhance its ability to compete. However, it does not follow from this that the UK needs more graduates, regardless of their academic discipline. Britain already has the highest proportion of 21 year olds graduating amongst Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. According to the OECD, 35.6 per cent of people aged 21 graduated in 1999. By way of contrast, only 14 per cent of British employees have intermediate level vocational qualifications compared to 46 per cent of German employees".
	The Government have pledged to expand access. Can we be certain that the funding will keep pace with the expansion? Are the Government convinced that the quality of higher education will not suffer? Are the Government not concerned about the number of young people drifting into higher education who would benefit much more from higher quality vocational training in further education or in the workplace? Are the Government satisfied with the quality of all degree courses? Do the Government accept that further education has much to offer young people, both in terms of high quality, sub-degree vocational education and in terms of providing education and training nearer to where students live, thereby avoiding mounting debt?
	The world beyond school is a tough and competitive place. For our country to compete successfully, the potential of all young people should be developed. The determination to expand higher education must not be at the expense of standards or of high quality vocational education and sub-degree courses in further education, which would be more appropriate for many students. Parity of esteem for all forms of education and training—academic and vocational—is also important. The important issues are the same for post-16 as for pre-16 education: provision should be appropriate to the educational needs, aptitudes and potential of every student. For the Government simply to say that they are spending more money misses the point of the debate. Greater professional freedom, academic freedom for our universities, flexibility, choice, quality and standards are the real issues.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, this has been a most informative and constructive debate. I, too, am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, for raising the issue of post-16 education. Our debate has ranged widely, from sixth form provision to apprenticeships, from further education colleges to adult learning provision. Along the way, noble Lords have been eloquent in their passion for education for all and their commitment to vibrant and high quality provision. I shall endeavour in the time allotted to me to demonstrate the Government's passion and commitment, as well, dare I say, as my own.
	Noble Lords have asked many questions and I fear that I may not answer them all to your Lordships' satisfaction in the time available. To save your Lordships' time, I say at the outset that, in reviewing the debate tomorrow, I shall ensure that I write to any whose questions I have failed to answer. I am sure that noble Lords will not hesitate to notify me if they believe that I have answered inadequately.
	Our objectives for learning from the age of 14—and for all children—are clear: to enable all young people to develop and to equip themselves with the skills, knowledge and personal qualities needed for life and work and to encourage and enable adults to learn, improve their skills and enrich their lives, especially those adults who lack basic skills.
	We have made significant progress. Our strategy started with the early years of education, when children lay the foundations for learning throughout life. The results speak for themselves. Over the past three years, key stage 2 English results have improved by 10 percentage points and maths results by 12 percentage points.
	That has helped to transform secondary education, where our key stage 3 strategy has resulted in a 3 per cent increase in maths and a 4 per cent increase in science scores. That translates to better GCSE results: more than 90 per cent of those at Level 6 and more than half of those at Level 5 go on to achieve five or more good GCSEs. The percentage of pupils achieving five or more GCSEs has risen by more than five percentage points since 1996.
	We are developing a flexible and challenging 14 to 19 phase of education to deliver a solid foundation for skills training and development. We have almost trebled the number of modern apprentices in training since 1997. From April to August this year, the first 12 Connexions partnerships went live, assisting more than 400,000 young people. In September, 16 FE colleges launched pathfinder centres for vocational excellence, leading the way for another 150 colleges to follow from next April. As with specialist schools, that will benefit the learner and the locality by sharing good practice.
	Increasing and broadening participation in higher education is fundamental to our vision for education. In September, we launched Excellence Challenge in schools and colleges, committing more than £190 million to get more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds into higher education. Our e-universities project, which is taking forward higher education excellence in online form, took another step forward on 19th October with the establishment of an operating company, UK eUniversities Worldwide Ltd.
	We are developing workforce skills, particularly the basic skills of the estimated 7 million adults with literacy and numeracy weaknesses, of whom up to half are in employment. From April to August this year, at least 70,000 learners achieved 105,000 literacy and numeracy qualifications. New national standards, national tests, core curriculums in literacy and numeracy and intensive teacher training are now available nationally after successful pilots in nine pathfinder areas. The Secretary of State launched the "Get On" promotion campaign on 30th August, encouraging all who need help with reading and writing to find it.
	That describes the progress that we have made. I shall now deal specifically with the comments that have been made in the debate. The noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, talked about teacher shortages. I hope that I have made it clear in debates and in answering Questions in your Lordships' House that we are not complacent. We recognise that we have things to do, but we also recognise that we have increased the number of teachers coming into the profession and that we have put in place other measures that I have mentioned before in your Lordships' House. I shall not take time now to go over them again, but I would not wish any noble Lord to believe that we are in any way complacent.
	A number of noble Lords, not least the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, asked about AS-levels. Noble Lords will know that there were concerns, which I recognise, about the introduction of the examination. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State asked the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority to review the current working of the reformed programme. A full report is expected in December.
	The review shows that schools and colleges supported the principles underlying the reforms to AS-levels, but, as noble Lords said, concerns were expressed about assessment and the timetable. As a result of those concerns, action has been taken in relation to the way in which AS-levels will be administered. But I was pleased to hear that the daughter of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, felt that they were of benefit to her. As the right reverend Prelate said, there has been a difficult birth; we now need to make the system work.
	It is important to understand that approximately 60 per cent of first-year sixth-form students have been studying at least four subjects this year. That compares with 10 per cent last year. Therefore, it is clear to me that we have done something to respond to the issues raised.
	The point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, about the length of courses is also important. Our three-year HE courses are admired by other European countries. There is no strong pressure to increase the length of those courses and no government intention to do so. Indeed, we want to expand the number of new two-year foundation degrees. I shall refer to those again in a moment.
	Accusations have been made of falling A-level standards. We must make very clear that the Government do not accept that A-level standards have fallen. We believe that our A-level students are successful and should be congratulated on the work that they do. However, we recognise that the way in which examinations are carried out changes. That is inevitable. There are different A-levels and different ways of assessing them. However, I do not accept that somehow the advances that have been made in relation to A-levels are a reflection on the standards. We have great students. They do great work and they work very hard. Their parents support them where they can. On that, we should congratulate them.
	It is also worth reminding noble Lords that the first cohort of students taking AS-levels has not yet gone through university. However, we have involved university bodies fully in discussions about the development of new AS-levels and A-level reforms. In broadening the curriculum, our proposals have been generally welcomed.
	I want to look carefully at the Learning and Skills Council. A number of noble Lords raised questions in this area. It is important to understand that the purpose of the new Learning and Skills Council is to ensure that reform in learning and skills development for young people and adults is both radical and enduring. It brings the promise of universal learning beyond compulsory schooling, with an integrated system of planning and funding for post-16 learning below higher education.
	Setting up the Learning and Skills Council from 2nd April has been a massive task. The noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, raised the issue of the transition and the difficulties involved. We have been trying to merge all post-16 planning and funding into a single organisation. We are confident that we have the right framework in place to ensure that the considerable sums invested in learning deliver real and demonstrable improvements in participation and achievement levels and in the quality of learning.
	The right reverend Prelate raised the question of the links with partnerships. The LSC clearly recognises the need to develop and maintain effective collaboration with schools and churches in planning local 16 to 19 education provision. It is considering how to strengthen collaboration with, and representation of, schools and churches at national and local levels to ensure that they have a clear voice in the development of 16 to 19 reorganisation proposals. Our proposed legislation will ensure that the LSC consults fully with all local interests in developing proposals for 16 to 19 education.
	The noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, referred to engineering courses. I pay tribute to the work that he does. As the Minister in the department who is responsible for Science and Engineering Year, I am particularly keen on the role that sector schools organisations may play in this matter.
	The training and enterprise councils, whose birth I remember, were based on the private industry councils in the US, which I had the fortune to visit in the early 1980s. There were wide variations in funding levels and funding arrangements for the TECs, and that is something that we have tried to examine and deal with in setting up the Learning and Skills Council. There is a new national transparent funding system for work-based learning for young people aged 16 to 25. Funding levels have been adjusted to ensure that the costs are properly recognised in relation to higher cost areas, such as engineering.
	It has always been our policy intention that 16 to 18 year-olds, who are relatively inexperienced and less mature, should be expected to take longer to learn—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, in relation to schools—and that they will attract less support from employer contributions to training costs than the 19 to 25 age group. That is why there is a differential in public funding.
	A number of noble Lords have talked about the relationship of the LSC with sixth forms. I begin by saying to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, that no top-slicing of the sixth-form budget is allowed at LSC or LEA levels. Good sixth forms, whatever their size or location, will continue to play a vital role in post-16 learning. New funding arrangements will reinforce that. It is important that sixth forms provide a high quality experience for their pupils, including an adequate range of subject choices.
	Our proposals for the Learning and Skills Council are not a threat to small sixth forms, which can collaborate effectively with other local providers. Noble Lords will have great experience of that collaboration in their localities. They will have seen the consortia that have enabled pupils, by working across schools, to gain a greater breadth of experience and opportunity. In answer to a point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Brigstocke, who, unfortunately, is not in her seat at present, we want to make it easier for 11 to 16 schools with a good track record to extend their contribution by opening sixth forms. The criteria that we propose will ensure that new sixth forms will be viable and will build on existing strength in 11 to 16 learning.
	We talked a little about the real terms guarantee and referred to the letter sent to Mr Harwood. The Government's real terms guarantee is designed to give schools with sixth forms an unprecedented guarantee that the funding for their sixth forms will be maintained in real terms so long as they maintain their pupil numbers. Once the guarantee has been met, the resources available will be used to raise the funding of sixth forms which are currently poorly funded. Well funded sixth forms will have their funding protected under the terms of the guarantee. In effect, schools will lose funding only if they lose pupil numbers. That has been the case within other parts of education for some time. We hope that that will provide some reassurance to those who are concerned about this matter.
	Some concern has been expressed as to whether the Learning and Skills Council provides the most appropriate forum in which to look at students studying A-levels. The implication—in particular as suggested in the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Brigstocke—was that A-levels were studied in schools. I want to bring to the attention of your Lordships that more students study A-levels in further education colleges than they do in sixth-form colleges. I believe that it is important to make that point. Therefore, I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, will accept that LSC funding for sixth forms has not decreased. Many sixth forms will gain from the new funding arrangements. I hope that she will accept that the real terms guarantee is worth something.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, raised the issue of bureaucracy in relation to the Learning and Skills Council. I hope that she will not mind if I refer her to the bureaucracy that existed with regard to the training and enterprise councils. We are trying to find a system that is less bureaucratic and easier to understand. That is part of the purpose behind the Learning and Skills Council.
	I move on to the subject of vocational training. Again, I want to recognise the contribution made by the noble Viscount, Lord Oxfuird, in relation to EMTA. We are not yet in a position to determine what will be a sector skills council. However, I am sure that we shall be in touch with the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, who is the president of an organisation in this field.
	Sector skills councils are important. They were announced on 16th October by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State. They will build considerably on the successful aspects of current sector skills arrangements delivered by the national training organisations. As noble Lords may be aware, their focus will be on industry and business sectors. We want to see a new relationship develop between different sectors—business employers, government and public agencies.
	The noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, referred to the future of training and to a framework for training. We are determined to raise the standards and improve the breadth of experience for young people who choose vocational training options. That must mean more emphasis on key skills, such as communication, the use of numbers and the better underpinning of knowledge and understanding. That is the intention behind our reforms of work-based learning.
	The noble Lord, Lord Pilkington, referred to specialist vocational colleges in the United States. He will no doubt be aware that those colleges combine vocational and general education in a single institution. Further education colleges in this country have a long tradition of providing technical and vocational training of young people and adults relevant to local and national employer needs. We are determined to strengthen that provision, and the additional resources that we have given to further education will, as I said, establish centres of vocational excellence in half of all general FE colleges by 2004.
	I turn to higher education. Your Lordships will be fully aware of the review that is underway, which means that at present I cannot answer the questions raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch. The department is in charge of the review; it will consult; a great deal of work is under way. I shall return to your Lordships' House as soon as I have more to say, and will endeavour to keep the noble Baroness and others informed of progress. I hope that that answer will be satisfactory. I am sorry that I cannot give her more information, but that is the nature of such reviews.
	I must tell the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, that we take seriously his comments about ensuring that expansion—which is important—is done with understanding and in discussion with universities to appraise what it necessary. I agree that universities are not the best place for all people, but I would not want anyone to assume that therefore children from lower socio-economic groupings do not belong there.
	As noble Lords will be aware, 70 per cent of children from higher socio-economic groups go on to higher education, compared with between 13 per cent and 14 per cent from lower socio-economic groups. I am well aware that university is simply not on the horizon for some children who are perfectly capable, could do well and enrich their lives and our society. They simply lack the opportunities. It is incredibly important to ensure that all those who would benefit from university education have that opportunity.
	The noble Lord, Lord Roberts of Conwy, referred to medical and related courses. In general, such courses remain over-subscribed with good-quality candidates. Medical students receive more favourable student support arrangements, as the noble Lord will know. Students in professions allied to medicine retain a system of grants as well as loans, and have their tuition fees paid. Medical students receive the same arrangements after year four of their course. I accept what the noble Lord has said from his experience and from his experience in Wales. It is not the general experience, but I am sure that Universities UK, which he mentioned several times, will raise those points with us.
	I turn briefly to the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Dearing. I am pleased that he welcomes Sir John Cassels' report on modern apprenticeships; we also welcome its broad thrust. It builds on the Government's reforms to strengthen and expand modern apprenticeships and sets out practical steps to help to achieve our ambition of a world-class apprenticeship system. The Secretary of State for Education and Skills and the Learning and Skills Council will respond to the report shortly. I fully endorse the concept that that forms part of the vocational ladder to higher education.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, referred to individual learning accounts. Under that programme, 8,500 providers and 2.5 million people have taken part. That is concrete proof of how much people wanted that opportunity. We acted quickly. The number of complaints was low in terms of the overall number of people involved. Most complaints did not concern the issues about which we had to act. We acted in July: we advised learners to guard against pressure selling. In September, we withdrew all non-personalised application forms. In October, the number of complaints was 8,000—0.35 per cent of the 2.5 million account holders.
	We have announced the withdrawal of the scheme from 7th December. All those who hold accounts can book courses until that time for some months beyond it. We recognise the issues for providers but this was a relationship between government and the learner, so we must be clear that that is our prime focus. However, my right honourable friend has said that we will endeavour to introduce a new system; and we will. As soon as I have more information on what and when that will be, I will be pleased to report it to your Lordships' House.
	The noble Lord, Lord Addington, raised, as always with passion, the issue of disabled children. I was discussing them with some headteachers of special schools, who are concerned to ensure that life skills are part and parcel of our work. I should enjoy another conversation with the noble Lord on those issues, which are high on my agenda. I believe in joined-up government and inclusion for all children and young children to the enrichment of all young people.
	The noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, spoke movingly about teenagers and issues for families. My right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer is highly aware of those issues. We provide education maintenance allowances for 70,000 young people aged 16 to 19. We are, through after-school homework clubs, providing opportunities for young people.
	I shall make two final points. On the curriculum, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Blackburn asked about religious education. We are committed to it; it lies within my portfolio. There is no question but that we are concerned with the spiritual welfare of children, which is important.
	For noble Lords who are worried about the breadth of the curriculum, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brigstocke, said, children are candles to be lit. I am a passionate supporter of broad opportunities—not simply within the curriculum; we offer children much that goes beyond it. To answer the noble Baroness, Baroness Walmsley, UK education funding will rise from 5 per cent of gross domestic product this year to a forecast 5.3 per cent by 2003-04. Finally, I must tell her that it is not the number but the quality of officials that matters.

Baroness Walmsley: My Lords, can the Minister confirm that her failure to answer my question about the £900 per year reduction in the funding of school sixth-form places is because she intends to answer it more fully next Monday, when a Starred Question of mine is on the Order Paper on the matter? If so, I shall try to be patient for five days.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I intend to answer that Question properly. I want to ensure that I provide a detailed Answer. The noble Baroness raises an important point. It is not lost on me. I shall answer it correctly, I hope.

Lord Pilkington of Oxenford: My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken. All the nasty issues of post-16 education have been raised: standards, vocational education, AS-levels, turning to the Continent for examples, and funding. I thank the Minister for her reply; she covered all the issues courteously and in detail. I am afraid that we shall all be back, gnawing at the carcass. I thank all noble Lords for their contributions and beg leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

National Heritage Bill [HL]

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
	Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Baroness Anelay of St Johns.)

On Question, Motion agreed to.
	House in Committee accordingly.
	[THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (Baroness Nicol) in the Chair.]
	Clause 3 [Exercise of certain ministerial functions]:

Lord Redesdale: moved Amendment No. A1:
	Page 2, line 44, at end insert—
	"( ) The Secretary of State shall provide the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England with such additional funds as are necessary for the Commission to exercise any functions specified by a direction under subsection (2)."

Lord Redesdale: The purpose of the amendment is simple: it is to question the ability of English Heritage to meet the onerous commitments of the new responsibilities under the Bill to deal with underwater archaeology.
	I thank the Minister for her kind letter after the previous stage of the Bill, explaining the financial position of English Heritage. However, the money allocated—£200,000 a year—which is to be ring-fenced for underwater archaeology, will come from the increases that English Heritage was promised before the Bill was drafted. Therefore, the money had already been ear-marked. So it could be argued that the £200,000, which English Heritage could have spent several times over because it is strapped for cash at present, is in effect a reduction in the increase that it is getting—although I am sure that the Minister will not consider it as such.
	The purpose of the amendment is to bring forward the case that has been put forward by the underwater archaeological lobby that the amount needed will be above £250,000. In fact it is estimated to be around £1 million or £1.2 million to meet the commitments for underwater archaeology. I hope therefore that the point will be taken on board that the funding of underwater archaeology will have to be re-examined. I beg to move.

Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn: In a general sense it must be that the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, is correct and that it will be desirable that significant funding is attributed to underwater archaeology on the English Heritage account when this Bill is enacted, as I hope that it will be. That is a point which I am sure the Government have fully in mind since their proposals were very close to those in the Bill as set down by my noble friend Lady Anelay.
	I cannot wholeheartedly support the amendment because one would not wish the Government, or indeed anybody else, to take fright at this stage at the financial commitments that ought to follow. Rather, I express the hope that when the Bill is enacted not only will consideration will be given to furnishing the sums which the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, says he has reason to believe will be supplied, but constructive consideration will then also be given to the further sums which will undoubtedly be necessary.
	However, I should be sorry to see this financial point, significant though it is and ultimately correct as I believe it to be, as an impediment to the passage of the Bill. For that reason I cannot entirely support the amendment, although I support the spirit in which it is moved.

Lord Bridges: I rise to support Amendment No. A1 because it concerns Clause 3 of the Bill, which is at the heart of this proposed legislation. Let us be clear, the intention of this Bill is to authorise the transfer of responsibility for underwater archaeology from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, to its affiliate body, English Heritage. Perceiving that, I have two consequential difficulties in mind.
	The first anxiety is that the purpose of the Bill is not adequately reflected in the Bill's title. At present it is simply called the "National Heritage Bill". That is misleading and I give notice that I shall seek to introduce an amendment at the next stage. I supposed at first that a better title might be "Underwater Archaeology Bill", but there are provisions in the text relating to English Heritage alone. It might be better therefore to propose "National Heritage and Underwater Archaeology Bill". We can debate that later. But I suggest that it would simplify the task of those looking through the statutes at large to find the specific law if words relating to underwater archaeology were included in the title. We can be sure that this Bill will be the subject of future litigation and it is important that it should be readily accessible.
	The second matter that I wish to raise concerns the wording of Amendment No. A1, which I am inclined to support, as I support the observations made on it by the noble Lord, Lord Renfrew. I support the need to increase the level of resources likely to be available to English Heritage to carry out its responsibilities in the future. Those responsibilities are large and go well beyond the financing of the periodic meetings of the Advisory Committee of Historic Wreck Sites which take place at present. Incidentally, I am informed that the chairman of that committee has lately resigned and I hope that that will not further complicate the transition.
	I hear that English Heritage has been making inquiries to discover what cash it can hope to receive to discharge its new mission. The results do not sound promising. This is not a case where the provision of a stool, desk and telephone in an attic room in Fortress House will be sufficient. Because of our long maritime history and our geographic position astride trade routes and strategic battle grounds in the past, we have large areas of seabed to protect and investigate—an area increased by the extension of our territorial waters to 12 miles. All that will require additional effort in cash, people and time.
	From my knowledge of the work of English Heritage in East Anglia, it is already suffering from a shortage of those resources. So in one sense it is not surprising, although deeply regrettable, that we were not able to vote in favour of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Underwater Heritage on 29th October. Although it was not explicitly acknowledged by our delegate there, the underlying reason for our abstention from the vote in favour of a convention appears to have been that we are almost alone in Europe in not having an effective protection and management regime for historic wrecks. That is disgraceful. In this area of activity we should be in the van, not in the rear rank in company only with Belgium.
	My fear is that this clause exemplifies the weakness of the Bill as a whole. It merely authorises the transfer of functions and says little or nothing about the discharge of responsibility. Perhaps that is a result of the Bill being presented in this form by a Member of the Opposition rather than by the Government. But at least I can understand or guess at the desire of the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, to transfer this difficult subject to another department.
	I have been in correspondence with the Minister about the forcible removal of a cannon by officials in her department. Her letter of reply arrived, surely not by chance, on Monday morning last and I shall reply to that shortly. Her letter is evidence, if it were needed, of the inability of those concerned in the department to understand the extent of the challenging issues which we face in the world of marine archaeology. I trust that that large responsibility will fare better under its new custodians. But that will require the commitment of additional resources and personnel skills. If the noble Baroness can reassure us on that point, it will greatly ease the passage of this Bill and give encouragement to those seeking to identify and protect our underwater heritage. That encouragement is sorely needed at present.

Baroness Carnegy of Lour: I agree that the title of the Bill is a little peculiar. It is difficult to know what the title should be. Although it relates to matters that are devolved to Scotland and, as I pointed out last time, touches on a devolved matter in Scotland, it is largely an English affair. It is somewhat insulting nowadays to talk about a "National" Heritage Bill when "National" usually means the whole country. I do not know whether or not the noble Baroness will be able to sort that out, or whether my noble friend will. It is an important issue.
	If the Committee will allow me, I should like to use the discussion of this matter of funding to thank the Minister for what she has done as a result of a matter I raised at Second Reading. It actually related to Clause 1, but one could say that it relates to the whole Bill. I raised several points about the order which the Secretary of State may make to delineate waters that are adjacent to England and waters that are not adjacent to England; in other words, the waters of other parts of the United Kingdom. I was worried whether there had been adequate consultation. I found that my colleagues who were Members of the Scots Parliament had never heard of the issue, and that seemed to me to be rather strange.
	I also asked the Minister about the bottom of estuaries, particularly the Solway Firth, where a wreck might roll from being in waters adjacent to England to being in waters adjacent to Scotland, thus bringing great riches to Scotland or the reverse. The noble Baroness very kindly wrote to me a very full letter on Monday. She had taken a great deal of trouble and I appreciate that enormously. She points out that there is a concordat, by which the different Parliaments together discuss such matters. That does not involve Members of the Scottish Parliament, only officials and the Executive. It may be that the issue will be raised in the Scottish Parliament. If so, how they deal with it will be a matter for them.
	Such issues need to be examined at Westminster when they crop up so that we can be sure that devolution is operating well. It will operate well only if we ensure that relationships between the different parliaments are correct. Therefore, I am extremely grateful to the noble Baroness. I hope that she feels that it was a useful exercise to consider the matter and ensure that we are operating correctly according to the rules as they stand at present.

Baroness Blackstone: Perhaps I may start by responding to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, and by focusing on the amendment and various points that he made in this little debate.
	As the noble Lord stated, I wrote to him after Second Reading and tried to set out the funding arrangements for the transfer of underwater archaeology to English Heritage. I am extremely sorry to say that I need to make a correction to the figures in that letter, but it is a correction on the right side. The grant-in-aid will be increased by £5 million in 2002-03 and £11 million in 2003-04, not £9 million for the second year as I stated in the letter. That is a substantial improvement. Those levels of grant-in-aid reflect the fact that we intend to transfer responsibility for underwater archaeology to English Heritage during that period. As the noble Lord rightly said, English Heritage has been advised that the Government expects it to devote at least £200,000 per annum from that increase to underwater archaeology. That is not a reduction. We anticipated that this would eventually happen.
	I should also make clear that that is in addition to the £340,000 per annum currently in the DCMS baseline for underwater archaeology administrative functions which will be transferred to English Heritage. That is the current cost to my department. An increase in spending of approximately 60 per cent will be available for underwater archaeology. I am sure that Members of the Committee will agree that that is quite a good increase. Underwater archaeology projects will be able to compete on equal terms with land archaeological projects for English Heritage grants.
	I fully appreciate, as did the noble Lord, Lord, Renfrew, that English Heritage want to do the best possible job for underwater archaeology. However, Members of the Committee will not be surprised to hear me say that there is only a finite amount of funding available, which has to be allocated by the department according to many difficult and conflicting priorities. I am grateful for the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Renfrew.
	It would be wrong to have an amendment of this kind on the face of the Bill. However, I do not think that that was the purpose of the amendment; the purpose was to probe. I hope that the probing has resulted in my being able to give information which will be helpful.
	Before responding to the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, perhaps I may respond to the noble Baroness, Lady Carnegy of Lour. I am grateful to her for her kind words. I am delighted that, having done a little more digging, I have been able to satisfy her about what will happen when the Bill is implemented in Scotland. I think that we are all clear that that will be all right and that perhaps some of her initial concerns were not justified. However, she was right to raise them.
	I was pretty flabbergasted by the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, on a number of fronts. I have dealt with the point on funding. Perhaps I may begin with the UNESCO Convention. It is simply untrue to say that the UK abstained from the UNESCO Convention because it lacks an effective protection and management regime for historic wrecks. I really rather resent that suggestion. The UK has had legislation to protect wrecks since 1973, during the lifetime of a number of different governments, and already manages designated wreck sites in accordance with the rules set out in the UNESCO Convention.
	However, we have concerns about the convention's proposal that the protection regime must be extended to all wreck sites over 100 years old, no matter what their historic significance. There are literally tens of thousands of wrecks off the coast of the UK. Therefore, we believe that that proposal would be impossible to implement and extremely expensive. The UK is therefore considering its position on the convention. Perhaps I may also say to the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, that the Ministry of Defence has considerable concerns over the status of warships as dealt with in the convention. That was another reason why the Government decided to abstain.
	I was puzzled by the noble Lord's suggestion that my department is simply handing over this matter to another department. That is absolute rubbish. English Heritage is an agent of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. I work closely with the chairman of English Heritage. My officials work extremely closely with its staff, including its chief executive. The noble Lord used the word "disgraceful" to describe the Government's position on the UNESCO Convention. I hope that I have explained why I think that is completely purple prose and unfair.
	Perhaps I may say that the noble Lord also indulged in a disgraceful attack on my officials, which was unacceptable. I find that particularly surprising, given that it came from a distinguished former official.
	I do not think that there are any other issues raised by the noble Lord which I need to address in response to the debate on the amendment. However, I hope that in the light of my comments the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for giving us the opportunity to debate the crucial matter of funding. If there is inadequate funding, the work of English Heritage across all its remit is at risk. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate in such an authoritative way. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, for her contribution and explanation and particularly, perhaps, for the correction upwards of the figure contained in the letter written to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale. I am sure that all noble Lords will carefully monitor the actions subsequently taken by the Government in funding matters with regard to English Heritage.
	Perhaps it is also appropriate at this point to thank my noble friend Lady Carnegy. I have found her experience in parliamentary matters, particularly in Private Members' Bills, to be extremely helpful and encouraging. If it had not been for her careful and persistent research, we would not have had such a clear explanation from the Government on several matters. I should like to register my thanks to her.
	It is right that I refer to several important matters raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bridges. He referred to the work of the Advisory Committee on Historic Wreck Sites and stated that he had been informed that the chairman had recently resigned. Perhaps I should make clear on the record that the chairman retired rather than resigned. I checked that matter this afternoon. Having served on the committee as chairman since March 1996, it is only for personal reasons that she is no longer in a position to continue as chairman. There is no reason that any of us should see her leaving in a sinister light. I am sure that if she were able to do so, she would love to continue with what is the light of her life.
	The noble Lord, Lord Bridges, expressed his anxiety that the provisions regarding maritime archaeology are not adequately reflected in the Bill's Short Title. Earlier today, he was kind enough to inform me of his concerns and I explained then that the Title was chosen on the advice of the Public Bill Office in June, when I went there to discuss the Bill. Staff in the Public Bill Office took great care at that stage to consider what might be the appropriate Short Title and they undertook a great deal of research. I acted upon their advice.
	After speaking to the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, today, I immediately returned to the Public Bill Office and I am grateful to the staff for their further advice. They have agreed that I may give the following information which I gleaned from my conversation with them. The Bill deals with more than underwater archaeology, vitally important though that is and neglected by many parliamentarians as it has been. But underwater archaeology is part of our national heritage, not separate from it. It is a most valuable part, as I stressed at Second Reading.
	The advice of the Public Bill Office remains that the current Short Title is appropriate and sufficient. The staff advised that if it were extended—for example, to become the National Heritage and Underwater Archaeology Bill—it would become more like a Long Title. They pointed out that even when a social security Bill deals with a particular group of people, perhaps only widows, the Bill is still entitled "Social Security Bill". They stated that, for example, the provision to change the national air traffic control system was simply entitled Transport Bill.
	Although I appreciate that the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, has good intentions and that he wants to make it as easy as possible for those interested in the provisions to be able to find the Bill in the indices, I am advised that the current Short Title should cause them no more difficulty in so doing than do other Short Titles in this regard.
	I hope that with that explanation the noble Lord might have further thought about his intention, which he announced tonight, to amend the Title of the Bill on Report or at Third Reading. I would greatly welcome further conversation with him on the matter after the Committee stage and hope that we can resolve it by amicable agreement.
	I conclude by repeating my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for tabling the amendment for debate. I am sure that we shall return to these issues in future debates, not least because the noble Lord has a great interest in these matters having been the prime mover in setting up the All Party Archaeological Group, for which we thank him. However, I hope that he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

Lord Redesdale: I shall dodge the arguments put forward in respect of the Short Title. They are wide of my amendment. However, the noble Baroness, Lady Carnegy, raised an interesting issue relating to her speech at Second Reading. She asked who would claim jurisdiction over wrecks which were in disputed waters between England and Scotland. However, I can see a different scenario which relates to the amendment; that is, that the two organisations may fight to claim that it was in the other's territorial water because of the funding implications of a proper dig.
	I did not expect the amendment to be moved—I was impressed that with the help of the Clerks I had managed to come up with a form of words which was almost acceptable. However, if the amendment were to be agreed to, it would result in the need for an open-ended cheque book. As the Minister said, there are vast numbers of wrecks and the amendment would commit many millions of pounds. Therefore, I beg leave to withdraw it.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: moved Amendment No. 1:
	Page 3, line 1, after "is" insert ", or may be,"

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: I tabled the amendment in response to views I have received within and outwith Parliament since Second Reading relating to the protection which can be given to sites. As the Bill is presently drafted, protection for sites can be given only when the Secretary of State is absolutely certain that the site is of historic or archaeological interest.
	I am advised that frequently when sites are first investigated—marine environments as such—a clear and positive identification of remains is not easy. Archaeologists may have a reasonable idea of what they might be looking at, but at that stage absolute certainty is not possible.
	I believe that if we can designate a wreck site on the basis that one has reasonable grounds to think it is significant, that will give it protection from less scrupulous people or bodies until investigations have been completed. A decision can then be made based on accurate data. At that stage, designation can be withdrawn if the site does not prove to be significant. The important point is that protection would be given by the amendment while investigations were underway. The site could therefore be protected from potential looters.
	I am advised that if the amendment were not on the face of the Bill, protection would not be possible and valuable sites could be put at risk. I therefore hope that the Committee will agree to the amendment. I beg to move.

Lord Bridges: As we are still on Clause 3, and as I have been corrected on a number of points, I hope that I shall be allowed to offer a few words of explanation. First, I had understood the chairman's retirement and I am grateful for the correction.
	As regards the Short Title, I yesterday spoke to the staff of the Public Bill Office and explained my intention to them. The form of words I used in my speech reflected what I was told. Evidently, there has been a misunderstanding and what I had intended will not be possible. I must consider the situation further.
	As regards the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, I did not suggest that in our voting record in the UNESCO convention we should give the reason that I cited. I merely suggest that that is the way in which it will be interpreted. It seems odd that we are unable to join that particular convention, which would be an indication of our commitment to the protection of the underwater cultural heritage. I am sorry that we are not able to do so. I did not believe that the alternative explanation given by the noble Baroness was particularly convincing.
	Perhaps I may also add in defence of what I have done that in my letter to the noble Baroness I invited her to visit us in order that we could explain our local difficulties. However, in her reply she did not refer to our invitation. It is still outstanding and I hope that she may feel able to take it up.

Baroness Blackstone: I am grateful for the invitation. However, the noble Lord will probably be aware that there is a long-standing issue around this excavation. It would be helpful if he and I could have a further discussion about it. I am sure that he will also understand that there are a lot of pressures on my time, as on all Ministers' time. My only reason for declining his offer to visit was pressure on my diary. I should be happy to talk to him at some point about the issues which concern him. I had hoped that the letter I wrote to him would convince him. However, it patently has not. But there is no connection between when the letter was sen and today's business. The letter was sent when I received a draft after officials had considered the matter, and I was able to sign it. I hope that the noble Lord will accept that I did not write to him either to discourage him from speaking tonight or to encourage him to do so.

Baroness Carnegy of Lour: Before the Minister sits down, I was hoping that she would say that she agreed with my noble friend that this was a desirable amendment. We were discussing the amendment rather than the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bridges. Are the Government in favour of the amendment? Do they think that it will suffice?

Baroness Blackstone: The Government are in favour of the amendment. If the Government had not been, I would have spoken. I took it for granted that it would be understood that we were entirely behind it.

Baroness Carnegy of Lour: We were waiting with bated breath to know what the Government thought about the matter. That is why none of us spoke.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: I am saved by my noble friend Lady Carnegy from having a heart attack. I thank her for getting to the heart of the matter and to the Minister for making it clear that the Government are in favour of the amendment.

On Question, amendment agreed to.
	Clause 3 agreed to.
	Clauses 4 to 7 agreed to.

Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn: moved Amendment No. 2:
	After Clause 7, insert the following new clause—
	"LOCAL AUTHORITY SITES AND MONUMENTS RECORDS
	(1) It shall be the duty of each responsible local authority in England to maintain an archaeological sites and monuments record.
	(2) The Secretary of State may by order prescribe—
	(a) the local authorities with responsibility under subsection (1),
	(b) the area of responsibility for each authority, and
	(c) standards to which sites and monuments shall conform.
	(3) In maintaining archaeological sites and monuments records, it shall be the duty of local authorities to record portable antiquities found by members of the public whose residence or place of work is within the area of the authority."

Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn: I repeat my thanks to my noble friend Lady Anelay of St Johns for introducing this useful Bill. Perhaps I may say how much I appreciated the Minister's gracious Second Reading speech in which she supported the Bill's principal provisions. I hope that the Minister will feel able to give a response to my amendment since we attach great weight to the Government's views on these matters. In a Bill of this kind, we would not wish to move an amendment unless it had, if not the support, at least the acquiescence of Her Majesty's Government.
	It is the same in substance as two amendments I set down for the Culture and Recreation Bill which had its Second Reading in January but which was unfortunately not proceeded with in the subsequent four months of the last Parliament. It is a probing amendment. I look forward to the observations that we may hear upon it.
	I now realise that it might have been better to set down two amendments: one dealing with sites and monuments records, which I do not believe requires any substantial financial provision, and another relating to the voluntary reporting of portable antiquities which might require such provision. If it seems appropriate to proceed with these matters on Report, I shall set down these two issues separately.
	The provision of sites and monuments records is central to the practice of archaeological conservation in this country including rescue archaeology, and hence to the protection of the national heritage. That is why it is pertinent to the Bill. Planning applications for new work are granted at district level and the availability of up-to-date data on archaeological sites which might be threatened or damaged in the course of development is of central importance to the system. With adequate information it is possible for appropriate conditions to accompany any planning permission which may be granted or indeed for planning permission to be withheld. In general, the system works reasonably well, and under the guidance of PPG 16 it is appropriately the developer who pays for any necessary remedial action.
	However, the maintenance of local sites and monuments records is very uneven throughout England and Wales. It is a local responsibility but not yet a statutory responsibility. Nearly all competent bodies are persuaded that it should be statutory. That is the view of English Heritage, the Institute of Field Archaeologists, the Heritage Forum (which the Minister addressed a few weeks ago), the Council of British Archaeology and the Association of Local Government Archaeological Officers. It was only this week that the Minister welcomed the report on the operation of the Treasure Act. Recommendation 19 of the report states:
	"The reporting of treasure to SMRs, which should be done by local reporting centres, needs to be improved, speeded up and made consistent. This would be greatly facilitated if local authorities were in future to be given a statutory duty to maintain SMRs".
	I am glad that the Minister welcomed that report, although she did not make specific reference to that recommendation in her welcome.
	It is fully recognised, of course, that some SMRs are organised at county level, some at district level while some are organised by consortia so that different detailed arrangements need to be made on an area by area basis. My amendment recognises that circumstance.
	The previous government, which had been planning to introduce such a statutory obligation as provided for in this amendment, held the view that this could be done on a de minimis basis: that the costs in each case of fulfilling the statutory requirement would not be so great that they would have to be met by a central government financial provision. That may or may not be the case, for certainly many SMRs are already well maintained. Those that are not would certainly require some resource input. But it is certainly arguable that the means should be found locally and that they would be so found if the obligation was a statutory one. On the other hand, there is no doubt that some additional Government support would be welcome.
	It may be that the noble Baroness will, if she comments on the amendment, refer to the proposals in the English Heritage sponsored document—and I am still not entirely clear who takes responsibility for it—Power of Place which we have already considered in this House in the debate initiated by my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu; namely, proposals for historic environment research centres.
	I am entirely in favour of these, as are most of the bodies which I mentioned earlier. But it is very clear that they would require significant funding. I shall be surprised if the Minister were to annmounce today that such funding will be immediately forthcoming and that historic environment record centres are to be set up immediately across the country. Perhaps I may emphasise that I would be entirely in favour of that for it is clear that the statutory obligation to maintain a sites and monuments record would be part of such an arrangement.
	But if we cannot be given such an immediate undertaking it would certainly be appropriate simply to refer to future hopes in that direction. It would not be appropriate to use this issue as a smokescreen to hide inactivity and as an excuse for doing nothing for the SMRs themselves. The best can be the enemy of the good and in the field of the nation's heritage we have sometimes become used to seeing neither. I refer here to the failure of the present Government's Department for Culture, Media and Sport to introduce any new legislation whatever in the heritage field and to see it through the appropriate procedures. For whatever the Government's good intentions, as reflected in the Culture and Recreation Bill, it failed to prosecute them in the four months between Second Reading and the general election.
	Therefore, I hope that when we hear the Minister's comments she will not seek to dispose of the matter of the SMRs by simply confusing the issue with that of the hypothetical historic environment record centres, which many of us do not expect to see in action during the life of the present Government. That would be no excuse for failing to grant statutory status to the SMRs.
	I note that to grant statutory status to the SMRs would be an excellent and inexpensive way of working towards the future HERCs, for some SMRs are held electronically and in most cases it would be possible to divide the data quite readily into open on the one hand, and administratively confidential or just too detailed on the other. Internet access to this open information would be a workable objective and a first step towards the intentions expressed in Power of Place for on-line access to the HERCs. That proposal would of course be in harmony with the Government's "culture on-line" strategy in so far as we were able to understand it from the rather sketchy outline presented in the Culture and Recreation Bill.
	So statutory SMRs can be seen as a necessary first step to statutory HERCs and any failure to implement the HERCs immediately would be no bar to immediate statutory status for the SMRs.
	I turn now to portable antiquities. One of the real achievements of the present Government in the heritage field has been the pilot scheme for the voluntary reporting of portable antiquities, and I am sure that we would wish to acknowledge that. The finds officers who have already been appointed are in general much respected locally, but the immediate future of the scheme is currently said to depend on a lottery bid. Even if the bid is successful, it will provide funding for only a limited period. Therefore, perhaps I may ask the Minister for a clear statement on this matter. Unlike the previous element of my amendment, to maintain the scheme on a national basis would require some central funding. It would not be reasonable to expect local authorities to take up this additional obligation without it. But such funding would be limited in extent. Perhaps the noble Baroness would care to give us her latest estimate. Once again, all of this has its culture on-line aspects, and the voluntary reporting scheme for portable antiquities already has its website and Internet access. I should find it strange if the Government could not see the possibility for progress in this respect.
	I recognise that the Government have recently taken a number of useful steps in relation to the archaeological heritage. Perhaps I may ask the Minister when she expects to introduce into this House the necessary formalities to complete Britain's accession to the 1970 UNESCO convention on the illicit traffic in cultural property.
	The provision of statutory status for our SMRs would be a modest yet highly valuable step in that direction. It would help to fulfil one of the provisions seen as desirable in relation to the UNESCO convention, and more particularly the Valetta convention, which already has statutory force. I beg to move.

Lord Redesdale: I am tempted to echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Renfrew, in expressing the hope that he will not press the amendment—obviously, we want the Bill to go through.
	However, I want to express my support for the sentiment behind SMRs, if not in the detail set out by the noble Lord. The issue is close to the heart of most archaeologists. It is one of the major, fundamental concerns that SMRs, given their part-time basis and their lack of funding, are a direct impediment to the dissemination of knowledge on which archaeology is based.
	I especially echo the noble Lord's comments on the portable antiquities scheme. He mentioned the problems with funding and that it is based on a lottery bid. But an additional problem is that, although the scheme is worthwhile and has been commended, and although it has demonstrated practical benefits, at present it is not country-wide. Vast areas of the country are not covered.
	I am an eternal optimist. I believe that, in their reply to Power of Place, the Government will announce that historic environmental record centres will be at the centre of the next Queen's Speech; I very much hope that they will announce that they are to be implemented as quickly as possible. That would solve our problems.
	I realise that this is a probing amendment merely to raise the issue. I hope that the noble Lord will not press it.

Baroness Blackstone: Perhaps I may take up the issue of the Culture and Recreation Bill raised by the noble Lord, Lord Renfrew. He also raised the matter at Second Reading. At that time I did not make any comment. The reason the Government did not prosecute it, to use the noble Lord's terminology, after Second Reading—and I believe that the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, will confirm this—was that Front Bench spokesmen from his own party in another place did not like the Bill. They threatened to table 1,000 amendments and made it absolutely clear that they would not agree to negotiate in the event of the Bill failing to complete all its stages in both Houses if a general election was called. So as a result of what the Government saw as a somewhat unhelpful and intransigent approach on the part of some of the noble Lord's colleagues in another place, the Bill fell.
	To return to the amendment, I am familiar with the arguments for placing SMRs on a statutory basis. As the noble Lord, Lord Renfrew, said, the matter was touched upon by English Heritage in Power of Place, suggesting that such provision is necessary in the longer term. However, before embarking on such a course—as I am sure the noble Lord will agree—we need clear definitions of exactly what SMRs should comprise and also what it will cost. Unfortunately, I am not able to give the noble Lord an estimate at this stage. We need to give a little more thought to definitions.
	As the noble Lord mentioned, as a more immediate aim, Power of Place recommended that SMRs should be expanded to become comprehensive historic environment record centres, the content of which would be widely accessible through electronic media. The report does not explain precisely what such records should comprise, but might include expanding the present archaeological records to embrace historic buildings, whether listed or not, possibly conservation areas, historic battlefields, parks and gardens, portable antiquities and various other things.
	All of that is an attractive option but it is a big undertaking. It is important that we look at the practicality of making electronic access to that data widely available given variations in the way SMRs are presently operated. The Government are, of course, giving more thought to how we can improve the present situation. Therefore, I am sympathetic to what lies behind the noble Lord's amendment. We shall have a little more to say about that in our forthcoming historic environment statement which, as I have already indicated on various occasions, will be published before the end of the year. Perhaps I may write to the noble Lord on one or two of the other issues he raised which do not have anything directly to do with the amendment. In the light of what I have said, I hope that he will feel able to withdraw the amendment.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: I am grateful to my noble friend for giving us the opportunity to debate the matter. It is core to our debates on how we record our heritage both as regards sites and monuments records and portable antiquities. He is an authority on that matter. I was also pleased to hear the views of the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, on those issues. I am sure it is something that we shall debate in detail. Certainly, with regard to SMRs, I am very much aware of the patchy provision around the country with regard to their maintenance. I understand from what the noble Baroness and my noble friend said that the Government are pursuing a somewhat different route—that of historic environment records. We shall follow the development of that government policy with interest.
	I attended the annual general meeting of local government archaeological officers in July and I am certainly very much aware of the importance they attach to the matter. The reasons I did not adopt the course suggested by my noble friend and include measures in the Bill on SMRs and portable antiquities is as follows. As it is a Private Member's Bill I tried to be as restrained as possible and to cover relatively few issues. I certainly feel as if I have been overambitious, limited though my Bill is. Certainly as an individual I did not believe that I had either the resources or the authority to canvass the views of all local authorities in the country with regard to their current approach to SMRs and the financial implications for them if such a measure were implemented. I was certainly aware that some might object to a statutory system and all would have wished to have government undertakings regarding funding to support such a system. I therefore felt, somewhat reluctantly, that this issue could be resolved only by the Government and not by an individual through a Private Member's Bill.
	I was certainly interested in the Minister's comments with regard to the Culture and Recreation Bill. She referred to my colleague in another place saying that the Opposition would table 1,000 amendments unless the Bill passed through all its stages. If that was said, it certainly was not in my hearing. I thought that I had attended all the ministerial meetings on that issue. That may not be the case and I shall certainly ask my honourable friend about what took place. In this House I believe that we tabled 180 amendments. The Government tabled 50 or so amendments to their own Bill before we reached Committee stage. It is a matter of record that the first meeting that the Government offered with the then Minister, Mr Alan Howarth, was offered late in the day. In practice, the Government offered us half a day in Committee on the Floor of the Chamber for a Bill with 40 or so clauses covering some contentious issues. The Minister may have been thinking of Part 4 which concerned culture on-line when she referred to opposition to the Bill. Perhaps, as always, there are two sides to that story. On this occasion, on this Bill, the two sides may come happily together. My noble friend was kind enough to refer to his amendment as a probing amendment. I therefore hope that he will withdraw it.

Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn: I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for his somewhat qualified support for the amendment. I understand his position and fully respect it.
	We shall not prosecute further the demise of the Culture and Recreation Bill. We could discuss that in greater detail but that might not be profitable on this occasion. Whatever the recommendations of my right honourable and honourable friends in another place, I saw many merits in Culture Online and I imagine that I would have seen more if the details had been more fully spelt out.
	I am grateful to the Minister for her careful words on the amendment. She said that the Government wish to give more thought to the issue and that they are sympathetic to it. She also said that we should await her historic environment Statement, which we will have before the end of the year. That will be most welcome.
	The Minister discussed historic environment research centres. I counsel again that the best can be the enemy of the good. While we support the concept of HERCs, it would be a disaster if the SMR issue awaited the resolution of all problems relating to HERCs. She rightly spoke about historic buildings, battlefields, gardens and so on. All those matters have to be resolved in relation to HERCs, whereas very few matters need to be resolved in relation to SMRs. She referred to definitions; I believe that definitions are being pored over and refined at this very moment and that within just a few weeks we shall have agreed definitions in this regard. I therefore encourage the Government to proceed with both approaches, but they will find that the SMR issue can be resolved sooner and that the HERCs issue can be resolved later. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Anelay for explaining the modesty of her Bill; it is indeed demure in all of its aspects and we hope that it will have a very happy passage through the House. To facilitate that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
	Clause 8 agreed to.
	House resumed: Bill reported with an amendment.
	House adjourned at twenty-five minutes before ten o'clock.